Gleaner October 2020

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Vol. 27 No. 6 October 2020

b u l C k o o B s Kid Storytime e m i T e m y Rh

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Some new old masters October is a huge month for new fiction, even more so in this COVID- impacted year. I’m sure you will make your own discoveries as well, but this month I’m pointing you toward Craig Silvey, Willian Boyd, Jane Harper, Chris Hammer, Gail Jones, Alice Hoffman, Ian Rankin and Trent Dalton. We are truly spoiled for choice. Here are three I’ve read in the last few weeks.

I’ve been revisiting two master writers, both with new novels: Marilynne Robinson Jack, and Richard Flanagan The Living Sea of Waking Dreams. Radically different styles, and reading them one after the other only reinforces the fact that the novel, at its best, can work in beautiful, rewarding ways.

In Jack, the fourth of Marilynne Robinson’s magnificent novels in the Gilead series, Robinson has focused on the most troubled and worrying character from that smalltown Iowa world. Into Jack’s life, as a small-time drunken criminal and drifter in 1940s St Louis, comes a respectable teacher from a godly black family. I can’t say enough praiseworthy things about Marilynne Robinson. The set of four Gilead novels, and Housekeeping (1980) are amongst the best books I know of, if your want to understand, and appreciate something fundamental about 20th/21st century America. Robinson has a deeply serious, deeply tender approach to her incredibly closely observed characters—this is writing of the first order. Her Calvinist preoccupations about fate and predestination make this book feel like a morality tale (those who have read Gilead and Home know that already). Jack is a slow moving story, but a riveting one.

Flanagan’s The Living Sea of Waking Dreams is a strangely beautiful book—full of the author’s exquisite imaginings, some real, some surreal. Centred around a dying, aged parent, and her daughter’s attempts to come to terms with that, the novel takes us at the same time, through interior reflection and intrusions from the outside world, where climate change, extinction, and other weird disappearances loom large, to apprehensions of loss and love and hope. It’s haunting and challenging, and quite compelling.

Steven Conte won the inaugural Prime Minister’s Award for Fiction back in 2008 for The Zookeeper’s War. His new novel, The Tolstoy Estate, has been well worth the wait. It’s an historical sage on a sweeping scale, set during the Nazi invasion of Russia in WW2—a German surgeon officer and a Russian woman areforced into contact by the invading army’s occupation of the Tolstoy Estate, where a field hospital is set up. Engrossing, often enthralling in its immersive detail (Conte has managed to produce some brilliantly original, non stomach-churning writing about surgery at the battle front)—this is a big, ambitious novel, with Tolstoy at its heart.

David Gaunt

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Australian Literature Literature Song of the Crocodile by Nardi Simpson ($33, PB)

Darnmoor is the home of the Billymil family, 3 generations who have lived in this ‘gateway town’. Race relations between Indigenous & settler families are fraught, though the rigid status quo is upheld through threats & soft power rather than the overt violence of yesteryear. As progress marches forwards, Darnmoor & its surrounds undergo rapid social & environmental changes, but as some things change, some stay exactly the same. The Billymil family are watched (and sometimes visited) by ancestral spirits & spirits of the recently deceased, who look out for their descendants & attempt to help them on the right path. When the town’s secrets start to be uncovered the town will be rocked by a violent act that forever shatters a century of silence. Nardi Simpson is a Yuwaalaraay writer, musician, composer & educator from North West NSW freshwater plains.

Honeybee by Craig Silvey ($33, PB)

Late in the night, fourteen-year-old Sam Watson steps onto a quiet overpass, climbs over the rail and looks down at the road far below. At the other end of the same bridge, an old man, Vic, smokes his last cigarette.

The two see each other across the void. A fateful connection is made, and an unlikely friendship blooms. Slowly, we learn what led Sam and Vic to the bridge that night. Bonded by their suffering, each privately commits to the impossible task of saving the other. A life-affirming novel that throws you headlong into a world of petty thefts, extortion plots, botched bank robberies, daring dog rescues & one spectacular drag show.

All Our Shimmering Skies by Trent Dalton

Darwin, 1942. As Japanese bombs rain down, motherless Molly Hook, the gravedigger’s daughter, is looking to the skies and running for her life. Inside a duffel bag she carries a stone heart, alongside a map to lead her to Longcoat Bob, the deep-country sorcerer who she believes put a curse on her family. By her side are the most unlikely travelling companions: Greta, a razor-tongued actress, and Yukio, a fallen Japanese fighter pilot. The treasure lies before them, but close behind them trails the dark. And above them, always, are the shimmering skies. ($33, PB)

Gleebooks’ special price $26.99

Rural Dreams by Margaret Hickey ($25, PB)

A girl finds strength in poetry, a football coach ponders obsession, a woman grapples with the fall out of an affair and a mother can’t and won’t stop swearing. In Binky, the character asks, ‘who gets the farm?’ and in Rescue, a backpacker is pulled out of a crocodile swamp. Using the lens of landscape, Margaret Hickey’s stories highlight the richness of life on the land, showcasing the beauty of lives lived outside city walls.

Life, Bound by Marian Matta ($25, PB) An artist’s progress is pleasingly channelled into a pattern laid down a century earlier. A solitary man’s story is almost preordained, but is indecipherable to researchers looking back some sixty years later. Karma mops up in the wake of a mousy clerk. A local legend falls foul of the town gossip. Spouses are constrained or liberated by love. Sexuality, gender, resentments, attachments & perversities all play a part. Yet the grip of the past needn’t always hold firm. Many protagonists are offered a potentially life-changing moment; whether or not they grasp it is up to them. Free agents or captives of our past? Marian Matta’s characters find themselves caught in situations not of their own making, or trapped by ingrained habits, walking in grooves carved out by past events.

Skyglow by Leslie Thiele ($24, PB)

A woman adjusts to her new urban landscape. A slaughterman comes to terms with the death of his wife. A rodeo ringer blows into town, wreaking havoc. Leslie Thiele’s collection ventures across distinct terrains—inviting and inhospitable, familiar and unknowable—into worlds of past, future and present. In settings that shift between the mundane and extraordinary, her short stories illuminate our continuous search for truth and what it means to find our way back home.

Letters from Berlin by Tania Blanchard ($33, PB)

1943 As the Allied forces edge closer, the Third Reich tightens its grip on its people. For eighteen-year-old Susanna Göttmann, this means her adopted family including the man she loves, Leo, are at risk. Desperate to protect her loved ones any way she can, Susie accepts the help of an influential Nazi officer. But it comes at a terrible cost—she must abandon any hope of a future with Leo and enter the frightening world of the Nazi elite. Yet all is not lost as her newfound position offers more than she could have hoped for. With critical intelligence at her fingertips, Susie seizes a dangerous opportunity to help the Resistance. The decisions she makes could change the course of the war, but what will they mean for her family and her future?

Now in B Format Too Much Lip by Melissa Lucashenko, $25

The Living Sea of Waking Dreams

by Richard Flanagan ($33, HB)

In a world of perennial fire & growing extinctions, Anna’s aged mother is dying—if her three children would just allow it. Condemned by their pity to living she increasingly escapes through her hospital window into visions of horror & delight. When Anna’s finger vanishes & a few months later her knee disappears, Anna too feels the pull of the window. She begins to see that all around her others are similarly vanishing, but no one else notices. All Anna can do is keep her mother alive. But the window keeps opening wider, taking Anna and the reader ever deeper into a strangely beautiful story about hope & love & orange-bellied parrots.

On D’Hill

Gleebooks’ special price $27.99

Our Shadows by Gail Jones ($33, PB)

Gail Jones’ new novel is a story about 3 generations of family living in Kalgoorlie, where gold was discovered in 1893 by an Irishborn prospector named Paddy Hannan, whose own history weaves in and out of the narrative. Nell & Frances are sisters who are close enough in age to be mistaken for twins. Raised by their grandparents, they now live in Sydney. Each in her own way struggles with the loss of their parents. Little by little the sisters grow to understand the imaginative force of the past & the legacy of their shared orphanhood. Then Frances decides to make a journey home to the goldfields to explore what lies hidden & unspoken in their lives, in the shadowy tunnels of the past.

Everything in its Right Place by Tobias McCorkell

Coburg, Melbourne. Ford McCullen is growing up with his mother Deidre & his Pop & Noonie in ‘The Compound’, a pair of units in the shadow of Pentridge prison. His father, Robert, has left them to live in the bush with his new male partner. Nobody is coping.

When Ford’s paternal grandmother Queenie’s good fortune allows him to attend a prestigious Catholic private school on the other side of the river where Ford finds himself balancing separate identities—being moulded into an image at odds with the rough & tumble of his beloved north. And so he embarks on a quest for meaning while navigating the uncomfortable realities of his father’s life, his mother’s ongoing crisis, and the pillars of football & religion, delving ever deeper into a fraught search for the source of the ‘McCullen curse’. ($30, PB)

Republished this month A Body of Water by Beverley Farmer, $29.95

Love Your Bookshop and we’ll Love You Back... with a KIDS’ BOOK SALE* Saturday 3rd - Sunday 11th October gleebooks Dulwich Hill See you there for bargains galore, Morgan Night Letters by Denise Leith ($33, PB)

Love, Clancy: A dog’s letters home edited & debated by Richard Glover ($30, PB)

Richard Glover has collated the letters sent by Glover’s kelpie, Clancy, to his parents in the bush. They are full of a young dog’s musings about the oddities of human behaviour, life in the big city, and his own attempts to fit in. You’ll meet Clancy as a puppy, making his first attempt to train his humans, then see him grow into a mature activist, demanding more attention be paid to a dog’s view of the world. Along the way, there are adventures aplenty, involving robotic vacuum cleaners, songs about cheese, trips to the country and stolen legs of ham—all told with a dog’s deep wisdom when it comes to what’s important in life.

The Godmothers by Monica McInerney ($33, PB)

Eliza Miller grew up in Australia as the only daughter of a troubled young mother, but with the constant support of two watchful godmothers, Olivia & Maxie. Despite her tricky childhood, she always felt loved & secure. Until, just before her 18th birthday, a tragic event changed her life. 13 years on, Eliza is avoiding close relationships & devoting herself to her job when out of the blue, she gets an invitation from one of her godmothers, and within a fortnight, finds herself in the middle of a complicated family in Edinburgh. But amidst the chaos, Eliza begins to blossom. She finds herself not only hopeful about the future, but ready to explore her past, including the biggest mystery of all—who is her father?

It’s Been a Pleasure, Noni Blake

by Claire Christian ($33, PB)

Noni didn’t expect to be starting over again at the age of thirty-six.

But eighteen months after the end of her long-term relationship, she knows it’s time to find out what’s next. While an encounter with a sexy blonde firefighter is a welcome entry back into the dating world, Noni soon realises she’s looking for more than just a series of brief-if pleasurable-encounters. That’s how she finds herself travelling to Europe to track down the one that got away- the alluring, elusive Molly.

But Europe has other surprises in store, not least of which is Beau, a tall, sexy, tattooist from Edinburgh.

For 5 years, Australian doctor Sofia Raso has lived in Kabul’s vibrant Shaahir Square, working with Dr Jabril Aziz to support the local women. Living peacefully in Kabul requires following two simple rules: keep a low profile; and keep out of local affairs. But when threatening night letters from the Taliban taunt the town, and young boys disappear from Jamal Mina, Kabul’s largest slum, Sofia can no longer remain silent. While the square is encased by fear, an elegant former warlord proves an unlikely ally, and a former lover re-emerges with a warning. As the search for the boys intensifies, and Sofia feels herself being drawn back into a love affair she thought had ended, it soon becomes clear that answers will bring a heavy price.

The Family Inheritance by Tricia Stringer

Felicity Lewis’s 50th birthday party is going off with a bang when disaster strikes. Her father, Franklyn, with his usual impeccable timing, has keeled over & died. For some members of the family, his wife Hazel for example, Franklyn’s death is not that great a loss. But when his toxic will is read out, it becomes clear that long-buried secrets are about to surface, starting with the astonishing reappearance of Hazel’s longlost sister. Franklyn’s death sets in motion a chain of events that will cause 3 generations of Gifford family women to question everything they hold dear—their relationships, their loyalties, even their identities.

Until, that is, they choose to fight back against their dark inheritance. ($33, PB)

Hitler’s Brothel by Steve Matthews ($30, PB)

Two sisters are brutally separated by war in tragic circumstances. Ania is imprisoned and forced to endure the atrocities of a Nazi concentration camp. Danuta’s search for her sister leads her into the dangers of the Polish Underground. Each will do what they must to survive long enough to find each other—but their dream of being reunited is crushed in shocking circumstances. In an astonishing twist of fate, the opportunity for revenge presents itself 60 years later. However, faced with the ultimate decision what will be the outcome—seek justice or revenge? Spanning decades, Steve Matthews’ novel is a tragic and gripping tale of deception, courage and survival.

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International Inte rnational Literature

Jack by Marilynne Robinson ($30, PB)

Marilyn Robinson returns to the world of Gilead with Jack, the final in one of the great works of contemporary American fiction. Jack tells the story of John Ames Boughton, the beloved & grieved-over prodigal son of a Presbyterian minister in Gilead, Iowa—a drunkard and a ne’er-do-well. In segregated St. Louis sometime after WW2, Jack falls in love with Della Miles, an African-American high school teacher, also a preacher’s child, with a discriminating mind, a generous spirit & an independent will. Their fraught, beautiful story is one of Robinson’s greatest achievements.

Earthlings by Sayaka Murata ($30, PB)

New from the author of Convernience Store Woman. Natsuki isn’t like the other girls. She has a wand & a transformation mirror. She might be a witch, or an alien from another planet. Together with her cousin Yuu, Natsuki spends her summers in the wild mountains of Nagano, dreaming of other worlds. When a terrible sequence of events threatens to part the 2 children forever, they make a promise: survive, no matter what. Now Natsuki is grown. She lives a quiet life with her asexual husband, surviving as best she can by pretending to be normal—but dark shadows from Natsuki’s childhood are pursuing her. Fleeing the suburbs for the mountains of her childhood, Natsuki prepares herself with a reunion with Yuu. Will he still remember their promise? And will he help her keep it?

When We Cease to Understand the World

by Benjamin Labatut ($30, PB)

The great mathematician Alexander Grothendieck tunnels so deeply into abstraction that he tries to cut all ties with the world, terrified of the horror his discoveries might cause. Erwin SchrÖdinger & Werner Heisenberg battle over the soul of physics after creating 2 equivalent yet opposed versions of quantum mechanics. Their fight will tear the very fabric of reality, revealing a world stranger than they could have ever imagined. Using epoch-defining moments from the history of science, Benjamin Labatut plunges into exhilarating territory between fact & fiction, progress & destruction, genius & madness.

Inside Story by Martin Amis ($35, PB)

This novel had its birth in the death Martin Amis’ closest friend, Christopher Hitchens. We also encounter the vibrant characters who have helped define Martin Amis, from his father Kingsley, to his hero Saul Bellow, from Philip Larkin to Iris Murdoch & Elizabeth Jane Howard, and to the person who captivated his 20s, the alluringly amoral Phoebe Phelps. What begins as a thrilling tale of romantic entanglements, family & friendship, evolves into a tender, witty exploration of the hardest questions—how to live, how to grieve—and how to die?

In his search for answers, Amis surveys the great horrors of the 20th century, and the still unfolding impact of the 9/11 attacks on the 21st—and what all this has taught him about how to be a writer.

At Night’s End by Nir Baram ($33, PB)

A writer wakes up in a hotel room in an unfamiliar city. His clothes are muddy; he doesn’t know how long he’s been lying in bed. Yonatan came to participate in a literary festival that is long over—why is he still here? When he attempts to reconstruct his lost days, he learns that he told people at the festival that his best friend had died. Except his friend is still alive. Yonatan stays on in Mexico City, reluctant to return to his wife and infant son back home in Tel Aviv. Convinced that his closest friend, Yoel, is going to die, he struggles to preserve his sanity.

But why is he so convinced? Does the answer lie in their childhood in Jerusalem, when it was them against the world?

Crossed Lines by Marie Darrieussecq ($30, PB)

When her mother offers Rose a Mediterranean cruise with her 2 children, she jumps at the chance to get away from her husband who drinks too much, and the renovations of their holiday house in the south.

But one night the cruise ship comes upon a shipwrecked boat full of refugees, who are taken aboard. Without telling her teenage son, Rose gives his mobile phone to a young Nigerian refugee. Does she want to be some kind of a hero, ease her conscience? Now what is she in for?

The secret phone connection takes Rose and her family on a journey of discovery. With her acid wit, Marie Darrieussecq, like Rachel Cusk or Jenny Offill, shines a light on issues of individual responsibility in our complex world.

Luster by Raven Leilani ($33, PB)

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Edie is not okay. She’s messing up in her dead-end admin job in her all white office, is sleeping with all the wrong men, and has failed at the only thing that meant anything to her, painting. No one seems to care that she doesn’t really know what she’s doing with her life beyond looking for her next hook-up. And then she meets Eric, a white, middle-aged archivist with a suburban family, including a wife who has sort-of-agreed to an open marriage and an adopted black daughter who doesn’t have a single person in her life who can show her how to do her hair. As if navigating the constantly shifting landscape of sexual and racial politics as a young, black woman wasn’t already hard enough, with nowhere else left to go, Edie finds herself falling headfirst into Eric’s home and family.

Trio by William Boyd ($33, PB)

A producer. A novelist. An actress. It is summer in 1968, the year of the assassinations of Martin Luther King & Robert Kennedy. While the world is reeling our trio is involved in making a rackety Swingin’ Sixties British movie in sunny Brighton. All are leading secret lives. As the film is shot, with its usual drastic ups and downs, so does our trio’s private, secret world begin to take over their public one. Pressures build inexorably—someone’s going to crack. Or maybe they all will. William Boyd’s new novel asks the vital questions—what makes life worth living? And what do you do if you find it isn’t?

Ghosts by Dolly Alderton ($33, PB)

In award-winning journalist and podcaster Dolly Alderton’s debut novel, 32-year-old Nina Dean is a successful food writer with a loyal online following, but a life that is falling apart. When she uses dating apps for the first time, she becomes a victim of ghosting, and by the most beguiling of men. Her beloved dad is vanishing in slow motion into dementia, and she’s starting to think about ageing and the gendered double-standard of the biological clock. On top of this she has to deal with her mother’s desire for a mid-life makeover and the fact that all her friends seem to be slipping away from her

The Cold Millions by Jess Walter ($33, PB)

The Dolan brothers live by their wits, jumping freight trains & lining up for day work at crooked job agencies. While 16-year-old Rye yearns for a steady job & a home, his dashing older brother Gig dreams of a better world, fighting alongside other union men for fair pay & decent treatment. When Rye finds himself drawn to suffragette Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, her passion sweeps him into the world of protest & dirty business. But a storm is coming, threatening to overwhelm them all.

Author of Beautiful Ruins (loved it, ed.), Jess Walter, offers an intimate story of brotherhood, love, sacrifice & betrayal set against the panoramic backdrop of an early 20th century America.

Burnt Sugar by Avni Doshi ($30, PB)

In her youth, Tara was wild. She abandoned her loveless marriage to join an ashram, endured a brief stint as a beggar (mostly to spite her affluent parents), and spent years chasing after a dishevelled, homeless ‘artist’—all with her young child in tow. Now she is forgetting things, mixing up her maid’s wages & leaving the gas on all night, and her grown-up daughter is faced with the task of caring for a woman who never cared for her. A love story and a story of betrayal—between The King’s Fool by Mahi Binebine ($33, HB) mother and daughter—sharp as a blade, Avni Doshi tests the limits of Sidi is dying. In the last days of this all-powerful tyrant, what we can know for certain about those we are closest to, and by his faithful court fool takes stock. During his service, the fool has been the king’s closest counsel, his most trusted extension, about ourselves. companion & adviser, privy to the king’s deepest secrets Afterland by Lauren Beukes ($33, PB) & most intimate thoughts—this honoured position has inAll Cole has left in the world is her boy, Miles. With men now a prized deed come at a terrible cost. What price the confidence of commodity, keeping him safe means breaking hastily written new a great king? Is it stories, jokes, witty repartee? Or does rules—and leaving her own sister for dead. All Miles has left in the the debt fall closer to home? Perhaps it must be paid far world is his mother. But is one person enough to save him from the from the magnificent palaces, feasting & festivities of the many who would kill to get their hands on a living boy? Together, royal court—in the death jails of a formidable prison fortress far out Cole and Miles embark on a journey across a changed, hostile country, in the desert; a place so feared that few dare to speak its name. towards a freedom they may never reach. And when Cole’s sister tracks them down, they’ll need to decide who to trust—and what loyalty really The Bitch by Pilar Quintana ($28, PB) In Colombia’s brutal jungle, childless Damaris develops means in this unimaginable new world. an intense & ultimately doomed relationship with an orBefore the Coffee Gets Cold 2: Tales from the Café phaned puppy. Damaris lives with her fisherman husband

by Toshikazu Kawaguchi ($19, PB) in a shack on a bluff overlooking the sea. Childless & at In a small back alley in Tokyo, there is a café which has been serving that age ‘when women dry up,’ as her uncle puts it, she is carefully brewed coffee for more than 100 years—and offering its cus- eager to adopt an orphaned puppy. But this act may bring tomers the chance to travel back in time. This 2nd volume brings the more than just affection into her home. Quintana writes story of four new customers each of whom is hoping to take advantage in a prose as terse as the villagers, with storms both meof Cafe Funiculi Funicula’s time-travelling offer—the man who goes teorological and emotional lurking around each corner. back to see his best friend who died 22 years ago, the son who was unable to attend his own mother’s funeral, the man who went back to see Many People Die Like You by Lina Wolff the girl who he could not marry & the old detective who never gave his An underemployed chef is pulled into the escalating viowife that gift. Kawaguchi once again invites you to ask yourself: what lence of his neighbour’s makeshift porn channel. An elderly piano student is forced to flee her home village when would you change if you could travel back in time? word gets out that she’s had sex with her 30-something Red Pill by Hari Kunzru ($33, PB) teacher. A hose pumping cava through the maquette of a When a Brooklyn writer leaves behind his young family to take up the giant penis becomes a murder weapon in the hands of a offer of a 3 month residency at the Deuter Centre on the shore of Ber- disaffected housewife. Winner of Sweden’s August Prize, lin’s Lake Wannsee, it turns out to be anything but the idyllic writerly Lina Wolff gleefully wrenches unpredictability from retreat he’d imagined so he opts to spend his time holed up in his bed- the suffocations of day-to-day life, shatters balances of room watching the ultraviolent cop show, Blue Lives. One night, while power without warning, and strips her characters down to at a glamorous party in the city, he meets Anton, the charismatic creator their strangest & most unstable selves. ($30, PB) of Blue Lives, and they strike up a passionate and alcohol-fuelled conversation about the pessimism at the show’s core. Thus begins an obsession Exiles from Paradise by Brigitte Adés with Anton that leads him on a journey into the heart of moral darkness that threatens to Farhad is a Franco-Iranian Muslim living in Paris. He & his friends face discrimination from employers, and rejecdestroy everything he holds most dear, including his own mind. tion for their Islamic faith, traditions & values. Tracking a long-lost heirloom, Farhad explores his family history & Now in B Format heritage across the globe. Nearer to home, Farhad’s closThe Eighth Life by Nino Haratischvili, $27 est friend Reza gets a job at an Islamic charity & begins to withdraw. Others fear that he is being radicalised, proThis Is Happiness by Niall Williams, $20 voking profound questions about the nature of nationality The Topeka School by Ben Lerner, $20 and identity in the 21st Century. ($23, PB)

Dominicana by Angie Cruz, $23

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Crime Fiction

A Song for the Dark Times by Ian Rankin ($33, PB)

When his daughter Samantha calls in the dead of night, John Rebus knows it’s not good news. Her husband has been missing for 2 days.

Rebus fears the worst—and knows from his lifetime in the police that his daughter will be the prime suspect. He wasn’t the best father, and now his daughter needs him more than ever. But is he going as a father or a detective? As he leaves at dawn to drive to the windswept coast—and a small town with big secrets—he wonders whether this might be the first time in his life where the truth is the one thing he doesn’t want to find.

The Devil and the Dark Water by Stuart Turton

‘An important book that speaks to our time.’

Tim Flannery

1634. Samuel Pipps, the world’s greatest detective, is being transported from the Dutch East Indies to Amsterdam, where he is facing trial & execution for a crime he may, or may not, have committed. Travelling with him is his loyal bodyguard, Arent Hayes, while also on board are Sara Wessel, a noble woman with a secret, and her husband, the governor general of Batavia. But no sooner is their ship out to sea than devilry begins to blight the voyage. 1st, an impossible pursuit. 2nd, an impossible theft. 3rd, an impossible murder. Could a demon be responsible for their misfortunes? With Pipps imprisoned, only Arent & Sara can solve a mystery that stretches back into their past & now threatens to sink the ship, killing everybody on board. ($30, PB)

The Survivors by Jane Harper ($33, PB)

Kieran Elliott’s life changed forever on the day a reckless mistake led to devastating consequences. The guilt that still haunts him resurfaces during a visit with his young family to the small coastal community he once called home. Kieran’s parents are struggling in a town where fortunes are forged by the sea. Between them all is his absent brother, Finn.

When a body is discovered on the beach, long-held secrets threaten to emerge. A sunken wreck, a missing girl, and questions that have never washed away.

special price $27.99

The Postscript Murders by Elly Griffiths ($33, PB)

DS Harbinder Kaur finds nothing suspicious in the death of 90-yearold Peggy Smith. Until her carer, Natalka reveals that Peggy lied about her heart condition and that she had been sure someone was following her. And that Peggy Smith had been a ‘murder consultant’ who plotted deaths for authors, and knew more about murder than anyone has any right to. And when clearing out Peggy’s flat ends in Natalka being held at gunpoint by a masked figure—well then, DS Harbinder Kaur thinks that maybe there is no such thing as an unsuspicious death after all. A literary mystery for fans of Agatha Christie.

City of Spies by Mara Timon ($30, PB)

‘A splendid social history, one so entertaining and revealing that you wonder why it hasn’t been done before.’

Amanda Lohrey

LISBON, 1943. After escaping from Nazi-Occupied France, SOE agent Elisabeth de Mornay, codename Cecile, receives new orders: she must infiltrate high society in neutral Lisbon and find out who is leaking key information to the Germans about British troop movements. As Solange Verin, a French widow of independent means, she will be able to meet all the rich Europeans who have gathered in Lisbon to wait out the war.

One of them is a traitor and she must find out who before more British servicemen die. But in a city that is filled with spies, how can she tell who is friend, or foe?

The Secret Life of Mr Roos by Håkan Nesser ($33, PB) ‘How to win an election? You could start by listening to Chris Wallace. She doesn’t have all the answers but ten off the top is a great start.’ Barrie Cassidy

‘A witty yet Machiavellian explainer of how to win at contemporary politics.’

Books + Publishing • • • The 2019 Australian election produced a surprise result showing, not for the first time, that every election is there for the winning – including the next one.

How To Win An Election spells out the ten things a political leader and their party must excel at to maximise the chance of success, and against which they should be accountable between and during elections.

Better performance in even a few of the areas canvassed in this book can change an election outcome, so full attention should be paid to each of them, all the time, every time, without fail, Wallace argues – in real time when it counts. How To Win An Election is a crucial insurance policy against overconfident leaders imposing learner errors on their supporters over and over again, and for getting the best results from Australia’s democratic system.

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CHRIS WALLACE

Labor’s surprise loss in 2019, like the Liberal and National parties’ defeat in the so-called ‘unloseable’ 1993 election, showed how careful attention to basic political craft can yield big dividends – and how inattention to it can turn apparently certain favourites into losers. With the vast challenges of climate change and social and economic equity in the post-pandemic world ahead of us, Australia cannot afford any more costly election accidents.

HOW TO WIN AN ELECTION

‘Elections in Australia are often decided by remarkably tight margins – a few thousand votes shift in some key seats and you get a different outcome. The campaigns parties run are complex and yet need to coalesce around strong, simple core messages. From the inside they are high-wire acts, often winner-take-all-bets. Chris Wallace brings original thinking and clarity to understanding the dynamics of elections and offers practical suggestions on how to win – including some that could probably only have come from an astute outsider.’

Geoff Walsh, ALP National Secretary (2000–2003), former adviser to Prime Ministers Bob Hawke and Paul Keating and Premiers Steve Bracks and John Brumby, veteran of nine Australian election campaigns

‘Ten Commandments for politicians – are you listening Labor? – who have forgotten the basics.’

LAURIE OAKES

HOW TO

WIN AN ELECTION

CHRIS WALLACE

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AUSTRALIAN POLITICS / CURRENT AFFAIRS A UNSW COMPANY

‘Ten Commandments for politicians – are you listening Labour? – who have forgotten the basics.’

Laurie Oakes A N I M P R I N T O F U N SW P R E S S

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59 year-old, Valdemar Roos works a job he hates, has a wife he barely talks to & 2 step-daughters he doesn’t get on with. When he wins the lottery he quits his job, buys a hut in the remote Swedish countryside and travels to this man-made oasis everyday, returning each evening to his unsuspecting wife. Then Anna Gambowska, a 21-year-old recovering drug addict arrives in his paradise, followed closely by her abusive ex. Inspector Barbarotti doesn’t take much interest when a woman reports her husband as missing. That is, until a dead body is found near the missing man’s newly-bought hut, and Mr Roos becomes the number one murder suspect

Night Falls, Still Missing by Helen Callaghan ($33, PB)

Fiona & Madison have been best friends since childhood, so when Madison sends her an unexpected request for help, Fiona doesn’t hesitate to answer the call. Madison is an archaeologist, working on a dig on a tiny island off the coast of Orkney, far to the north of Scotland. But when Fiona gets off the ferry, Madison isn’t there to meet her—she’s missing—and Fiona has no choice but to go to Madison’s colleagues for help. But in such a small community, can she be sure one of them isn’t responsible? And if they are, is Fiona the only one who knows enough to save her oldest friend?

Fall Out by Mark Grenside ($28, PB)

An LA screenwriter is killed shortly after completing his latest script, Fall Out—a blockbuster written with a secret double purpose. The screenplay is sent to a group of people who are all connected to a movie that had abruptly stopped shooting in the jungles of the Philippines years before. From a powerful Agent’s office in Hollywood, hidden treasures in Belgravia & a remote chalet in the Swiss Alps to murder at the Cannes Film Festival, producer Marcus Riley & designer Melinda (Mako) de Turris use clues concealed in the script clues to unravel a lethal puzzle.

A Time for Mercy by John Grisham ($33, PB)

Jake Brigance finds himself at the epicentre of a sensational murder trial that bitterly divides the citizens of Clanton, Mississippi when he is made court-appointed lawyer for 16-year-old Drew Gamble, a young man accused of murdering a local deputy. Many in Clanton want a swift trial & the death penalty, but once Brigance learns the details of the case, he realizes he has to do everything he can to save Drew—and his commitment to the truth puts Jake’s career and the safety of his family at risk.

BOOKS

IN

FOCUS

‘Picked it up, could not put it down. Brutal, beautiful, absolutely golden.’

‘A wildly entertaining suite of tales, anecdotes, observations and reflections that can have you laughing out loud on one page and moved to tears on the next.’

‘Unnervingly accurate, always funny, Richard Glover effortlessly inhabits the mind of a fine dog.’

Trust by Chris Hammer ($33, PB) Martin Scarsden’s new life seems perfect, right up until the moment it’s shattered by a voicemail: a single scream, abruptly cut off, from his partner Mandalay Blonde. Racing home, he finds an unconscious man sprawled on the floor & Mandy gone. Someone has abducted her.

So starts a twisting tale of intrigue & danger, set in a Sydney riven with corruption and nepotism, privilege and power, as Martin probes the past of the woman he loves, a woman who has buried her former life so deep she has never mentioned it. It’s time to face her demons once and for all—and learn how to trust.

special price $29.99

The Witch Hunter by Max Seeck ($30, PB)

Detective Jessica Niemi is called to investigate a murder case which is completely out of the ordinary. The wife of a famous writer, Roger Koponen, appears to have been killed in a bizarre ritual. As more ritual murders occur in the coming days, its becomes obvious that Jessica is after a serial killer. But the murders are not random - they follow a pattern taken from Roger’s bestselling trilogy. Has a devoted fan lost their mind, or is this case more personal? This is the first in Finnish author Max Seeck’s series featuring Jessica Niemi.

Vinyl Detective 5: Low Action by Andrew Cartmel

Semi-retired god of rock guitar & local poseur Erik Make Loud has got himself a new girlfriend. Helene Hilditch, ex guitarist of allgirl punk outfit Blue Tits—and someone is trying to kill her. With a rare pressing of their first album to find, the Vinyl Detective & Nevada are soon called in to help but with a trail of grudges behind her, the list of people who could want Helene dead includes her exbandmates, their former producer turned record label mogul—even Blue Tits’ old roadie. The only person who isn’t a suspect is Delia, the Blue Tit’s bass player who has already been murdered. ($18, PB)

Over My Dead Body by Dave Warner ($33, PB)

Cryogenicist Dr Georgette Watson has mastered the art of bringing frozen hamsters back to life. Now what she really needs is a body to confirm her technique can save human lives. Meanwhile, in NYC, winter is closing in, and there’s a killer on the loose, slaying strangers who seem to have nothing in common. Is it simple good fortune that Georgette, who freelances for the NYPD, suddenly finds herself in the company of the greatest detective of all time? And will Sherlock Holmes be able to save Dr Watson in a world that has changed drastically in 200 years, even if human nature has not?

The Sicilian Method by Andrea Camilleri ($33, PB)

Mimi Augello is visiting his lover when the woman’s husband unexpectedly returns—he climbs out the window & into the downstairs apartment, where he sees a body lying on the bed. The the body of Carmelo Catalanotti is found. Catalanotti was a director of bourgeois dramas who used an acting method of digging into his actors’ complexes to unleash their talent, that was a traumatic experience for all. Are the two deaths connected? Catalanotti kept notes & comments on all the actors he worked with as well as strange notebooks full of figures, dates & names. Montalbano uses Catalanotti’s dossiers & plays, to solve the crime—it is in the theatre where he feels the solution lies.

The Unwanted Dead by Chris Lloyd ($33, PB)

Paris, Friday 14th June 1940—the Nazis march into Paris. Paris police detective Eddie Giral—a survivor of WW1—watches helplessly on as his world changes forever. But there is something he still has control over. Finding whoever is responsible for the murder of four refugees. The unwanted dead, who no one wants to claim. To do so, he must tread carefully between the Occupation and the Resistance, between truth and lies, between the man he is and the man he was.

All the while becoming whoever he must be to survive in this new and terrible order descending on his home..

Death Leaves the Station by Alexander Thorpe

Set in 1927, this interwar murder mystery has a distinctive Australian flavour. A nameless friar turns up at Halfwell Station, at the same time that Ana, the adopted daughter of the station owners, discovers a body in the desert nearby when she goes for a midnight walk. But when she returns to look for it, the body is gone. ($28, PB)

Now in B Format This Poison Will Remain by Fred Vargas, $20 The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa, $20 The Man That Got Away by Lynn Truss, $20

Clare Bowditch

Julia Baird

Matt Condon

True Crime

Murder Maps: Crime Scenes Revisited; Phrenology to Fingerprint 1811–1911

by Dr Drew Gray ($50, HB)

Drew Gray revisits intriguing 19th century murders from around the world, taking the reader on a perilous journey around the world’s most benighted regions. In each area, murders are charted with increasing specificity: beginning with city—or region-wide overviews, drilling down to streetlevel diagrams & zooming-in to detailed floor plans. All the elements of each crime are meticulously replotted on archival maps, from the prior movements of both killer & victim to the eventual location of the body. The murders revisited range from the ‘French Ripper’ Joseph Vacher, who roamed the French countryside brutally murdering & mutilating over twenty shepherds & shepherdesses, to H.H. Holmes, who built a hotel in Chicago to entrap, murder & dispose of its many guests.

Dancing with the Octopus: The Telling of a True Crime by Deborah Harding ($35, HB)

One Omaha winter day in 1978, when Debora Harding was just 14, she was abducted at knife-point, thrown into a van, assaulted, held for ransom, and left to die. But what if this wasn’t the most traumatic, defining event in her childhood? Undertaking a radical project, Harding dexterously shifts between the past & present to unravel her story. From the immediate aftermath to the possibility of restorative justice 20 years later, her book lays bare the social & political forces that act upon us after the experience of serious crime.

Crime Dot Com by Geoff White ($40, HB)

On 4 May 2000, an email that read ‘kindly check the attached LOVELETTER’ was sent from Philippines. Attached was a virus, the Love Bug, and within days it had paralysed banks, broadcasters & businesses across the globe. The age of Crime Dot Com had begun. Geoff White charts the astonishing development of hacking, from its birth among the ruins of the Eastern Bloc to its coming of age as the most pervasive threat to our connected world. From Ashley Madison to the 2016 US Presidential Election, White takes us inside the workings of real-life cybercrimes, revealing how the tactics of high-tech crooks are now being harnessed by nation states. and how we might protect ourselves from it all.

Also New this month: Pure Narco: The Real-life Tales of Luis Antonio Nava aka ‘El Senador by Jesse Fink & Luis Nava ($35, PB)

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Biography

JA N E H A R P E R

Even the deepest secrets rise to the surface...

The compelling new novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Dry.

To Asia,

ith Love

HETTY MCKINNON From the award-winning author of Community.

Killing Time: Short stories from the long road home by Jimmy Barnes ($45, HB)

Everyday vegetarian recipes unlike anything you’ve experienced before.

B O R N T H I S WAY F O U N DAT I O N R E P O R T E R S WITH

L A DY G AG A

A collection of fifty-one stories of kindness, bravery and resilience from young people all over the world.

CO M IN 27 O C G T

PR E-

O RD ER N OW

ANDREW PIPPOS A magical saga of love, family and second chances.

‘One of the best Australian novels I’ve read in years’ Emily Bitto

Love talking about books?

Find us online at Pan Macmillan Australia

Lowitja by Stuart Rintoul ($45, HB)

Lowitja O’Donoghue is a powerful & unrelenting advocate for her people—she sat opposite Prime Minister Paul Keating in the first negotiations between an Australian government & Aboriginal people & changed the course of the nation. But when she was born in 1932 to an Aboriginal mother & a white father in the harsh and uncompromising landscape of Central Australia the expectations for her life could not have been more different.

At the age of 2, she was handed over to the missionaries of the Colebrook Home for Half-Caste Children—and would not see her mother again for another 30 years, with no memory of her father. In 2001 a bitter controversy arose over whether Lowitja was ‘stolen’ as a child. In search of a past she did not remember, she went back to Central Australia accompanied by journalist Stuart Rintoul—completing that journey into Lowitja’s life and the challenging history of her times.

Gleebooks’ special price $39.99

Healing Lives by Sue Williams ($35, PB)

In 1962, 3 years after Drs Catherine & Reg Hamlin arrived in Ethiopia, an illiterate peasant girl sought their aid. Mamitu Gashe was close to death & horrifically injured during childbirth after an arranged marriage—at the age of just fourteen to a man she’d never met—in a remote mountain village. The Hamlins’ Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital saved her and, in return, Mamitu dedicated her life to Catherine’s mission. Under the iconic doctor’s guidance, Mamitu went from mopping floors & comforting her fellow patients, to becoming one of the most acclaimed fistula surgeons in the world, despite never having had a day’s schooling. This is the moving story of the friendship that saved the lives of over 60,000 of the poorest women on earth.

Hollywood Park by Mikel Jollett ($33, PB)

Mikel Jollett was born in an experimental commune/cult in California, which later morphed into the Church of Synanon. Per the leader’s mandate, all children were separated from their parents when they were 6 months old, and handed over to the cult’s ‘School’. After spending years in what was essentially an orphanage, Mikel escaped the cult one morning with his mother & older brother. Raised by a clinically depressed mother, tormented by his angry older brother, subjected to the unpredictability of troubled step-fathers & longing for contact with his father, a former heroin addict & ex-con, Jollett slowly, often painfully, builds a life that leads him to Stanford University and, eventually, to finding his voice as a writer and musician, forming the band The Airborne Toxic Event..

8

Max by Alex Miller ($30, PB) According to your 1939 Gestapo file, you adopted the cover names Landau and Maxim. The name your mother and father gave you was Moses. We knew you as Max. Novelist Alex Miller searches for the elusive past of Max Blatt, a man he loves, who loved him and who taught him that he must write with love. Max’s story unfolds, slowly at first, from the Melbourne Holocaust Centre’s records then to Berlin’s Federal Archives. From Berlin, Miller travels to Max’s old home town of Wroclaw in Poland. And finally in Israel with Max’s niece, Liat Shoham, and her brother Yossi Blatt, at Liat’s home in the moshav Shadmot Dvora in the Lower Galilee, the circle of friendship is closed & the mystery of Max’s legendary silence was unmasked.

Jimmy Barnes shares more than 40 yarns reflecting an epic life— from an encounter with a soul legend in Memphis, a night in a haunted studio in upstate New York, and a doomed haircut in Thailand to a madcap misunderstanding in a Japanese ski resort, a family feud on a remote coral atoll, and an all-too-revealing appearance for a Sydney charity.

In this volume Barnes has refined his unique voice with this wildly entertaining suite of tales, anecdotes, observations and reflections that can have you laughing out loud on one page and moved to tears on the next.

Gleebooks’ special price $39.99

A Repurposed Life by Ronni Kahn ($33, PB)

As the owner of a successful events company, throwing away huge volumes of leftover food at the end of the day came with the territory. But when Ronni Kahn hit midlife, she found herself no longer able to turn a blind eye to her food waste problem. Hand delivering the untouched food to homeless shelters around Sydney became her renegade solution. Little did she know that fixing her small problem at work would lead her to unlock a hidden purpose at the very core of her inner life. From her early years growing up under the brutal system of apartheid South Africa, to a socialist commune in Israel, Kahn finally settled in Australia to discover a profound new way of living—this is the story of how she found her voice, her heart & her deepest calling. .

The Haunting of Alma Fielding

by Kate Summerscale ($30, PB)

London, 1938. Alma Fielding, an ordinary young woman, begins to experience supernatural events in her suburban home. Nandor Fodor—a Jewish-Hungarian refugee & chief ghost hunter for the International Institute for Psychical research—begins to investigate. In doing so he discovers a different & darker type of haunting—trauma, alienation, loss—and the foreshadowing of a nation’s worst fears. As the spectre of Fascism lengthens over Europe, and as Fodor’s obsession with the case deepens, Alma becomes ever more disturbed. Kate Summerscale shadows Fodor’s enquiry, delving into long-hidden archives to find the human story behind a very modern haunting.

Only Happiness Here: In Search of Elizabeth von Arnim by Gabrielle Carey ($33, PB)

Elizabeth von Arnim is one of the early 20th century’s most famous— and forgotten—authors. Born in Sydney in the mid 1800s, she went on to write many internationally bestselling novels, marry a Prussian Count & then an English Lord, nurture close friendships with H.G. Wells & E.M. Forster & raise 5 children. Her novels were ahead of their time in their representation of women & their pursuit of happiness. Intrigued by von Arnim’s extraordinary life & career, Gabrielle Carey sets off on a literary & philosophical journey to know more about this talented author.

A Different Kind of Seeing: My journey

by Marie Younan & Jill Sanguinetti ($30, PB)

Marie Younan was born in 1952 into a family of Assyrian refugees living in north-eastern Syria. Accidentally blinded by her grandmother as a baby, she was locked out of school, play & social gatherings—the quiet, ever-present listener. The family migrated to Beirut, and then, in the mid-70s, to Melbourne to escape the Lebanese civil war. Being blind, Marie was denied a visa—forced to wait in Syria & Athens for 3 years before the family could sponsor her to Australia. Unable to speak English, dependent for everything on her family, Marie, in her words, was ‘only half alive’. Then, in 1985, aged 33, she attended the Royal Victorian Institute for the Blind, where she became fluent in English, literate in braille & physically mobile with the help of a cane.

Educated, independent, and professionally qualified at last, her life began to take off.

Now in B Format Unfollow: A journey from Hatred to Hope

by Megan Phelps-Roper, $23 The Cherry Picker’s Daughter by Kerry Reed-Gilbert, $24.95 Bridge Burning and Other Hobbies by Kitty Flanagan, $20

Travel Writing

The Ways of the Bushwalker by Melissa Harper

From the earliest days of European settlement, colonists found pleasure in leisurely strolls through the bush, collecting flowers, sketching, bird watching & picnicking. Yet over time, walking for the sake of walking became the dominant motive. Walking clubs proliferated, railways organised mystery hikes attended by thousands, and Paddy Pallin established his equipment business. Bushwalking—serious walking—was invented. Whether you are inclined to put on your walking boots & pack your sleeping bag, or would rather stay in a luxury hut, this surefooted & witty book reveals how the ordinary act of walking can become extraordinary. ($35, PB)

Places We Swim: Exploring Australia’s Best Beaches, Pools, Waterfalls, Lakes, Hot Springs & Gorges

by Dillon Seitchik-Reardon & Caroline Clements

From lap pools to ocean pools, rockpools to hot springs, this book covers the breadth of Australia, bringing you the 60 best places to swim, dive, jump, paddle and float around the country. What makes each swimming spot unique, when is the best time to go—with destinations ranging from the neighbourhood city pool to remote outback waterfalls, this book is a celebration of not just these magnificent swimming spots, but of the diverse landscapes & communities that make up Australia. ($40, PB)

Maiden Voyages: Women and the Golden Age of transatlantic travel by Sian Evans ($33, PB)

Before convenient air travel, transatlantic travel was the province of the great ocean liners & never more so than in the glory days of the interwar years. The ocean liner was a microcosm of contemporary society, divided by class: from the luxury of the upper deck, playground for the rich & famous, to the cramped conditions of steerage or third class travel. These iconic liners were filled with women of all ages, classes & backgrounds: celebrities & refugees, migrants & millionairesses, aristocrats & crew members. Full of incredible gossip, stories & intrigue, Maiden Voyages has a diverse cast of inspiring women—from A-listers like Josephine Baker, Marlene Dietrich & Wallis Simpson, Violet ‘the unsinkable’ Jessop, a crew member who survived the sinking of the Titanic & entrepreneur Sibyl Colefax, a pioneering interior designer.

The highly anticipated new novel by the bestselling author of Jasper Jones.

He violated her past and haunts her present. Now he’s threatening their future.

A profoundly moving novel about two lives forever changed by a chance encounter.

The riveting new thriller from the bestselling author of Scrublands.

OUT NOW

OUT 13 OCTOBER

The incredible story of the legendary Australian ship’s cat who survived the sinking of HMAS Perth and the Thai-Burma Railway.

OUT NOW

The 99% Invisible City by Mars & Kohlstedt

Have you ever wondered what those bright, squiggly graffiti marks on the sidewalk mean? Or stopped to ponder who gets to name the streets we walk along? Or what the story is behind those dancing inflatable figures in car dealerships? This book zooms in on the various elements that make our cities work, exploring the origins & other fascinating stories behind everything from power grids & fire escapes to drinking fountains & street signs. With deeply researched entries & beautiful line drawings throughout, The 99% Invisible City is an eyeopener for anyone curious about design, urban environments & the unsung marvels of the world around them. ($40, HB)

The Border—A Journey Around Russia

by Erika Fatland ($35, PB)

On an extraordinary odyssey through the 14 countries that border Russia today From North Korea into China, through former Soviet states & breakaway republics in Asia & the Caucasus, crossing the Caspian & Black Seas, northwards to Europe, into the Arctic Circle & through the icy waters of the Northeast Passage, lone traveller Erika Fatland drinks tea with a reindeer nomad in Mongolia & encounters displaced Ingushetians in Kazakhstan; she meets a history professor-turned-tank driver in Ukraine & tours the vestiges of Chernobyl. She hears an extraordinary story of endurance from one of the last survivors of the Minsk Ghetto, and learns that the area of Russia that borders Norway, her own country, is the most polluted place in the world. This is the log of an unmatchable journey, offering vivid portraits of cultures & individuals living at the limits of this dominant land mass.

The Flightless Traveller: 50 modern adventures by land, river & sea by Emma Gregg ($45, HB)

Discover how to explore the world sustainably & responsibly.

Take your pick from 50 inspiring trips that take you by boat, train & foot to some of the most amazing places on Earth. Including city destinations & wild retreats, activity-packed holidays & beach breaks—each trip includes full journey details & traveller’s tips, as well as suggested time of year to visit. Illustrated with photographs, as well as specially commissioned maps plotting the main land & sea routes around the globe & within each continent.

The Gran Tour by Ben Aitken ($30, PB)

When Ben Aitken learnt that his gran had enjoyed a four-night holiday including four three-course dinners, four cooked breakfasts, four games of bingo, a pair of excursions, sixteen pints of lager and luxury return coach travel, all for a hundred pounds, he thought, that’s the life, and signed himself up. Good value aside, what Aitken was really after was the company of his elders. A series of coach holidays ensued—from Scarborough to St Ives, Killarney to Lake Como—during which he tries to shake off his 30-something blues by getting old as soon as possible.

Why The Germans Do It Better: Lessons from a Grown-up Country by John Kampfner

Today, as much of the world succumbs to authoritarianism and democracy is undermined from its heart, Germany stands as a bulwark for decency and stability. Mixing personal journey & anecdote with compelling empirical evidence, John Kampfner has written a searching & entertaining exploration of the country many in the West still love to hate. Raising important questions for a post-Brexit landscape, Kampfner asks why Germany has become a model for others to emulate, while Britain still languishes in wartime nostalgia & fails to tackle contemporary challenges. Part memoir, part history, part travelogue, this is a rich & witty portrait of a fascinating country. ($30, PB)

On Fiji Islands by Ronald Wright ($30, PB)

In little more than a century, Fiji islanders have made the transition from cannibalism to Christianity, from colony to flourishing self-government, without losing their own culture. As Ronald Wright observes, societies that do not eat people are fascinated by those that did, and often used this fact as an excuse to conquer, kill & enslave. Touring cities bustling with Indian merchants, quiet Fijian villages & taking part in communal ceremonies, he attributes the remarkable independence of Fiji to the fact that the indigenous social structure remains intact & 83% of the land remains in local hands. ‘Ronald Wright is a superb travel writer with a vivid historical imagination.’—TLS

Also Available by Ronald Wright ($35 & $30 PB): Time Among the Maya: Travels in Belize, Guatemala & Mexico Cut Stones & Crossroads: A Journey in the Two Worlds of Peru Nala’s World by Dean Nicholson ($33, PB)

When 30-year-old Dean Nicholson set off from Scotland to cycle around the world, his aim was to learn as much as he could about our troubled planet, he wasn’t expecting to come across an abandoned kitten on a remote road in the mountains between Montenegro & Bosnia. Something about the piercing eyes & plaintive meowing of the bedraggled little cat proved irresistible, so he put her on his bike & with the help of local vets, nursed her back to health. He and Nala forged an unbreakable bond—both curious, independent, resilient & adventurous.

Experiencing the kindness of strangers, visiting refugee camps, rescuing animals through Europe & Asia, Dean & Nala have learned that the unexpected can be pretty amazing.

9

books for kids to young adults

picture books

Sandcastle by Einat Tsarfati ($28, HB)

Our Girl by Anthony Browne ($26, HB)

A little girl builds a sand castle complete with domes, turrets, crocodile moat and a sea view. The royals arrive to admire the sandy architecture and partake in the grand party in the Ballroom. But by morning, trouble’s afoot—sand in the strudel, sand in the suit of armour, sand in bath!’ In fact, there’s sand everywhere. How to appease the royal guests? And here comes the tide.

Night Walk by Marie Dorleans ($32, HB)

Mama opened our bedroom door. ‘Come on, you two,’ she whispered. ‘We need to go now, to get there on time.’ Excited, the sleepy family step outside into a beautiful summer evening. They’ve entered a night-time world, quiet and shadowy, filled with fresh smells and amazing sights.

Gorgeous illustrations evoke the awe & mystery of childhood adventures in the dark.

non fiction

The Bushfire Book: How to Be Aware and Prepare

by Polly Marsden (ill) Chris Nixon

She’s lovely, our girl! Award winning ex-Children’s Laureate Anthony Browne offers a joyful and empowering celebration of daughters, granddaughters, sisters and girl-children everywhere— showing all the many things that girls can be.

The House by the Lake by Thomas Harding (ill) Britta Teckentrup ($28, HB)

On the outskirts of Berlin, a wooden cottage stands on the shore of a lake. Over the course of a century, this little house played host to a loving Jewish family, a renowned Nazi composer, wartime refugees & a Stasi informant; in that time, a world war came & went, and the Berlin Wall was built a stone’s throw from the cottage’s back door. Thomas Harding has rendered his Costa short-listed biography into a deeply moving picture-book for young readers—with magnificent artwork by staff favourite, Britta Teckentrup.

6 to 8

fiction What Zola Did on Tuesday

Written by Polly Marsden, the creator behind the concept for the documentary series Big Weather and How To Survive It, hosted by Craig Reucassel, this a practical and reassuring book for children to help them understand bushfires and what action they can take to feel less anxious and more prepared as Australia faces longer and more intense bushfire seasons. ($20, HB)

Wild Cities by Ben Lerwill ($30, HB)

Wild stories of animals adapting to live in our urban world—like the swampwallaby spotted hopping across the Sydney Harbour Bridge, or the fox who took up residence on the 72nd floor of the Shard in London. The small furry rock hyraxes (or dassies) of Capetown— whose closest relative is the elephant, high flying Parisian kestrels or the skunks of New York. A charming companion to the animal poetry collection—lots of subject matter for your own poems.

Tiger, Tiger, Burning Bright! An Animal Poem for Every Day of the Year (ed) Fiona Waters (ill) Britta Teckentrup

Speaking of animals & poems—this lavishly illustrated collection of 366 animal poems—for every day of the year—ranges from classics to contemporary works from around the world, including poetry in translation. Hard to limit yourself to just one poem—I’ve just spent an hour immersed in this book, and googling all the poets. But if you are strong-willed enough to take it one poem day—and commit each to memory. ($50, HB)

Funny Kid Belly Flop (Funny Kid, #8)

by Matt Stanton ($15, PB)

Max and Abby hardly ever agree on anything ... until now!

They are both desperate to get out of this Friday’s swimming carnival. Max is the funny kid, and there’s a swimming carnival that needs cancelling! A sea-monster, the maths olympiad, spotty rashes, good twin vs bad twin and a swimming instructor named Chad are just some of the things in store for Max and his friends.

Punching the Air

by Yusef Salaam & Ibi Zoboi ($20, PB)

Teen fiction

One fateful night, an altercation in a gentrifying neighbourhood escalates into tragedy. ‘Boys just being boys’ turns out to be true only when those boys are white. Suddenly, at just sixteen years old, Amal Shahid’s bright future is upended: he is convicted of a crime he didn’t commit and sent to prison. Despair and rage almost sink him until he turns to the refuge of his words, his art. A powerful novel in verse about a boy who is wrongfully incarcerated from author Ibi Zoboi & prison reform activist Yusef Salaam of the Exonerated Five.

Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman

Caden Bosch is on a ship that’s headed for the deepest point on Earth: Challenger Deep, the southern part of the Marianas Trench. Caden Bosch is a brilliant high school student whose friends are starting to notice his odd behaviour. Caden Bosch is designated the ship’s artist in residence to document the journey with images. Caden Bosch pretends to join the school track team but spends his days walking for miles, absorbed by the thoughts in his head.

Caden Bosch is split between his allegiance to the captain and the allure of mutiny. Caden Bosch is torn. ($19, PB)

10

($13, PB)

by Melina Marchetta (ill) Deb Hudson

Zola loves living on Boomerang Street with her mum & nonna. Every day is an adventure—and no matter how much she tries, she can’t keep out of trouble! This the 2nd in a series of seven Zola stories—one for every day of the week.

Sherlock Bones and the Sea-creature Feature by Renée Treml ($15, PB)

Sherlock Bones is a tawny frogmouth skeleton (really) and a mystery-solving superstar! In this new cartoony outing, Sherlock B & his trusty partners, clever Watts (technically a stuffed parrot), sassy Grace and a new hard to track sidekick aim to solve the mystery of the monster in the museum.

2 new Aussie Kids: Meet Matilda at the Festival

by Jacqueline de Rose-Ahern (ill) Tania McCartney ($13, PB)

Matilda goes to a festival at the Japanese Embassy where her friend Hansuke lives.

But Hansuke is going back to Japan soon and Matilda doesn’t want to say goodbye.

Meet Dooley on the Farm by Sally Odgers (ill) Christina Booth

Dooley’s cousin is visiting his farm. We’ll swim in the river, feed the calves and collect berries. But best of all, we’re going to sleep out in the barn! ($13, PB)

8 to 12

The Puffin Book of Big Dreams ($33, HB)

This collection is perfect for reading aloud or reading independently at bedtime, with brand new stories, poems and illustrations from exciting new Puffin talent including Jacqueline Wilson, Malorie Blackman, Anne Fine, Jamie Littler, Jeremy Strong, Tom Fletcher, Sam Copeland, Ed Vere, Nadia Shireen, plus carefully curated extracts from Puffin’s classic family favourites like Eric Carle, Beatrix Potter, Allan Ahlberg, Michael Morpurgo, Julia Donaldson and Roald Dahl. With quotes & motivational pieces from inspiring leaders, scientists & actors sharing their own big dreams.

The Silver Arrow by Lev Grossman ($15, PB)

Kate wasn’t expecting much when she wrote to her wealthy estranged uncle to ask for a birthday present. Certainly she wasn’t expecting a colossal steam train called the Silver Arrow to arrive on her doorstep. When Kate & her brother Tom climb aboard the train’s engine to roar into life, taking them to a train station where an assortment of strange & beautiful creatures are waiting with tickets in their mouths—it’s their job will be to see them safely home—if they can. A rip-roaring adventure from desert plains to snow-covered mountains packed with creatures like the indignant porcupine, the lost polar bear and an adorable baby pangolin.

Clancy of the Overflow (The Matilda Saga, #9)

by Jackie French ($20, PB)

Jed Kelly has finally persuaded her great aunt Nancy to tell the story of her grandparents. The tale that unfolds is that of Clancy of the Overflow, who gave up everything for Rose, the woman he adored—but Nancy’s story is not the history that Jed expects. The stories of the women hidden in Australia’s long history, the story of Clancy’s growing passion for the bush, immortalised in Banjo Paterson’s poem, and Nancy’s need to pass on her deep understanding of her country. And also the love story that never happened, between Matilda O’Halloran & Clancy of the Overflow. As Jed brings all of these stories to life in her book, Matilda & Clancy will once again waltz beside the river and the forgotten will be given a new voice.

The Other Side of the Sky by Amie Kaufman & Meagan Spooner ($20, PB)

Prince North’s home is in the sky, in a gleaming city held aloft by intricate unknown technology. But North believes his sky island is sinking. Its engines are failing, and the key to saving his home is to venture to the place the engines were first created. Nimh is the living goddess of her people on the surface, responsible for providing answers, direction—hope. But in the midst of the surface’s worst crisis yet, a mist that spreads madness and poison, doubts have arisen among the people about Nimh’s divinity. She must find a way to manifest her power - before she is overthrown, and all is lost. North’s and Nimh’s lives are entwined—though their hearts can never be. Linked by a terrifying prophecy and caught between duty and fate, they must choose to either save their people, or succumb to the bond that is forbidden to them.

Fantastically fun reads from Fremantle Press ks

Board boo

More new board books

Beautiful, bold wildflowers are front and centre in this colourful counting board book for the very young. A wonderful way to introduce bubs to unique Australian flora.

ovels

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Picture bo

More new picture books

Dozens of delightful dogs are the heroes in this book of opposites: from clean and grubby to skinny and chubby, smooth and shaggy to grumpy and waggy!

Fiction

Graphic n

When Sally Tinker’s nemesis hatches a fowl and poultry plot to devolve chickens into dinosaurs, there’s no room for the lily-livered.

Sally and co. will need all their pluck to return the world to its rightful pecking order.

Also available in the series

When Jessie and Kay find a hidden book, they uncover the secret of the mischief-makers who, from Ancient Greece to Victorian London, have clandestinely shaped the past.

Hopping vampires, drooling neighbours: Mei Ling Pang is kicking her bad luck to the curb. This fresh take on the Chinese folk legend of the jiangshi is full of humour and heart.

e Morat gre ds rea

11

Food, Health & Garden

The Scandinavian Skincare Bible

by Johanna Gillbro ($35, PB)

Think drinking water will replenish your skin? Think again. More products, better skin? Nope. And an expensive product doesn’t guarantee reliable results. You don’t need to cleanse your skin in the morning; in fact, too much cleansing can be damaging. Toner is redundant, natural products are not always best, and bacteria are not the enemy. This is a comprehensive guide to skincare that also teaches you about the ingredients of skincare products. It shows you exactly what it is you’re putting on your skin—which ingredients to look for, and look out for.

Using cutting-edge research about the skin’s microbiome, as well as the relationship between gut health & skin, the book reveals the science behind skincare, exposes commercial tricks—empowering you to lay the foundation for healthy skin.

The Heart Health Guide by Catherine Itsiopoulos

Heart disease is the single leading cause of death in Australia. Diet is a key factor in preventing & reducing the risk factors of heart disease. Scientifically backed by decades of peer-reviewed research, the Mediterranean diet is a rigorously tested diet that has been proven to prevent heart disease & diabetes, help with weight management & promote longevity. Sustainable, satisfying & suitable for the whole family, this is a diet that is a proven pathway to better heart health as much as it promotes long-term good health and wellbeing.

Dr Catherine Itsiopoulos, Australia’s leading expert on the Mediterranean diet, shows us how to improve your heart health. ($35, PB)

Plant Therapy by Dr Katie Cooper ($35, HB)

Broken down into 3 chapters: The Human-Nature Relationship, Living with Plants & a ‘Plantopedia’, Katie Cooper’s book explains how we have come to exist in an environment that is at odds with our mental, emotional & physical needs, then explores how we can readjust this balance, before showcasing plants that help us to breathe, restore balance, and boost our wellbeing. When research has shown that the presence of plants can decrease blood pressure, increase productivity & calm anxiety, both at home & at work, why wouldn’t you pick up this book & create your own calming oasis?

Royal Gardens of the World by Mark Lane ($70, HB)

This is a sumptuous exploration of 21 of the world’s most celebrated royal gardens, from the formal splendour of Versailles to the organic, sustainable Highgrove. Journey in mainland Europe from the formal splendour of Het Loo in the Netherlands & Fontainebleau in France to the Baroque World Heritage Site of the Royal Palace of Caserta in Southern Italy. Further afield lies the Taj Mahal in India & the Peterhof Palace in Russia. Each featured garden includes the history, plantings & evolution of the garden as well as plant portraits of key plants & information about the design & layout of each.

Adelaide Hills Gardens by Christine McCabe

The Adelaide Hills charts the evolution of gardening in Australia.

Old oak, elm & ash trees, planted long ago after memories of English gardens, live alongside stringybark eucalypts & native bush gullies, fruit-bearing orchards & wineries. Over time, the Hills has weathered storms, droughts & fires, and heavily forested slopes have, in many cases, given way to veggie patches, free-ranging chickens & sheep, while Victorian rose & rhododendron hordes have made room for climate-compatible native flora. Christine McCabe tells the stories of 20 gardens, from grand Victorian estates & repurposed municipal water tanks. ($80, HB)

Soupologie 5 a day Soups

by Stephen &Anastasia Argent ($35, HB)

A powerhouse collection of soups and meal pots that deliver 5 portions of fruit and veg (sometimes more!) that are also low in calories, sugars, carbohydrates and salt, plus are dairy & gluten free. Recipes range from soups such as Pea & Watercress (which also includes onion, apple, spinach & garlic) and Tomato & Aubergine (which also includes onion, peppers, carrot & basil) to Spiced Pineapple & Tomato Stew (which also includes sweet potato, peppers, onion & garlic).

Each one makes enough for one person but can easily be adapted for larger servings.

Japanese Cooking for the Soul ($33, PB)

This cookbook introduces 70 simple yet sumptuous recipes to bring exquisite dishes to everyday life. From Veggie Crunch Rolls and Yakatori Chicken Skewers, to Crab Tempura and Matcha Cheesecake, Japanese Cooking for the Soul caters to every taste, bringing hearty lunchtime favourites and indulgent eats to life through easy-to-follow recipes.

Super Fresh: Meals in Minutes by Donna Hay

Donna Hay delivers delicious meals packed with flavour & nutrition, with a minimum of fuss. ‘Simple made special’ is the foundation of almost every recipe Hay has ever written.

She’s all about the classics, but also about a flexible, fresher approach to eating—constantly on the lookout for ways to make something easier, healthier, quicker or a little more on-trend—and she also loves a cheat, a quick-fix or anything that can be made in one bowl, that still tastes great. ($45, PB)

12

Australian Food by Bill Granger ($50, HB)

These days from Sydney to Tokyo, and London to Seoul, queues form outside Bill Grangers eateries to enjoy ricotta hotcakes (‘Sydney’s most iconic dish’ Good Food 2019), fluffy scrambled eggs, lively salads & punchy curries. It is a bright picture of Australian food that has travelled across the globe, packed with fresh flavours and local produce, healthy but never preachy, whose main ingredient seems to be sunshine itself.

Gleebooks’ special price $44.99

Use it All: The Cornersmith guide to a more sustainable kitchen by Alex Elliott-Howery

For years Cornersmith’s Alex Elliott-Howery & Jaimee Edwards experimented in their home kitchens to figure out how to feed their families efficiently, affordably & sustainably. The result is this invaluable guide to modern food wisdom. Structured around weekly seasonal shopping baskets, this book includes: More than 230 recipes with alternative flavour combinations so you can adapt a recipe to what you have on hand; Clever ideas to make the most of the whole ingredient so that a little goes a long way; Waste hacks for turning tired produce or offcuts into something special. ($40, PB)

Comida Mexicana: Snacks, tacos, tortas, tamales & desserts by Rosa Cienfuegos ($45, HB)

From breakfast tamales in the thriving metropolis of Mexico City to the tacos you find on every street corner, to incredible snacks & heartier fare, like chicharrónes & tortas, and latenight treats like elotes & churros—with all of its 70 recipes photographed, and dynamic images of Mexican life throughout the book, this is the perfect gift for the armchair traveller or anyone wanting to throwback to their trip to Mexico.

To Asia, With Love by Hetty McKinnon

Hetty McKinnon’s new recipes range from the traditional— salt & pepper eggplant, red curry laksa, congee, a perfectly simple egg, pea & ginger fried rice—to her uniquely modern interpretations, such as buttery miso vegemite noodles, stir-fried salt & vinegar potatoes, cacio e pepe udon noodles, grilled wombok caesar salad with wonton crackers, banh mi turned into a salad, a soy-sauce-powered chocolate brownie or a rainbow guide to eating dumplings by the season. All share an emphasis on seasonal vegetables & irresistible Asian(ish) flavours using pantry staples. ($40, PB)

Gleebooks’ special price $34.99

Vegan With Bite by Shannon Martinez ($35, HB)

Shannon Martinez, presents more than 80 thoughtful but easy meals (complete with shopping tips and cheffy hacks) that are guaranteed to take the meal beyond the meat-and-dairy-free predictable. Alongside her recipes, Shannon shares her essential kitchen larder, a did-you-know guide to ingredients that are not actually vegan (but that many cooks think are, and vice versa), plus advice on leftovers and cutting back on waste. There’s also a chapter on dips, condiments and sauces described by Shannon as the essential glue that brings her meals together.

How to Eat Your Christmas Tree

by Julia Georgallis ($17, HB)

Julia Georgallis explores the unsung edible heroes of our forests—the humble Christmas trees & their evergreen friends to offer recipes for ferments & preserves, feasts, sweet treats & drinks. Don’t throw it away, extend the life of your Christmas tree & turn it into delectable delights to enjoy throughout the year using simple ideas such as infusing pine needles to make a delicious & warming Pine Tea to more lavish spreads such as a decadent Fur-Cured Salmon.

Italian Cooking School: Dolci ($65, HB)

Learn all the basics of Italian sweets, including how to prepare puff pastry, shortbread & brioche, before exploring classics like Wine & Anise Donuts, Blackberry Cheesecake & Tiramisu with Mascarpone & Espresso; smaller bites such as Cream Puffs (Bigne) with Chocolate Mousseline & Coconut & Almond Cakes with Strawberry Compote; and beautifully plated dishes, including a Coconut & Mango Chiffon Cake, a Pavlova with Rose Cream & Plum & a Semifreddo Truffle with Cocoa & Hazelnuts.

Vegetables by Ferrandi Paris ($50, HB) Drawing on the expertise of the world-renowned professional culinary school FERRANDI Paris, this book shows how to equip your kitchen, the essential techniques cover everything from grating, seeding & pureeing to poaching, blanching & roasting more than 80 different vegetables varieties. With over 70 recipes—smoothies, soups & soufflés to curries, risottos & tarts, from basic tips to Michelin-level creations.

Performing Arts

To the End of the World: Travels with Oscar Wilde by Rupert Everett ($35, PB)

In his 3rd memoir, Rupert Everett tells the tale of how he set out to make a film of Oscar Wilde’s last days, and how that 10year quest almost destroyed him. (And everyone else.) Travelling across Europe for the film, he weaves in extraordinary tales from his past, remembering wild times, freak encounters & lost friends. There are celebrities, of course. But we also meet glamorous but doomed Aunt Peta, who introduces Rupert (aged 3) to the joys of make-up.

In 90s Paris, his great friend Lychee burns bright, and is gone. While in 70s London, a ‘weirdly tall, beyond size zero’ teenage Rupert is expelled from the Central School of Speech and Drama. Unflinchingly honest and, as always, entertaining, Everett offers a unique insight into the ‘snakes & ladders’ of filmmaking.

Bruce Springsteen: All the Songs ($75, HB)

by Philippe Margotin & Jean-Michel Guesdon

Spanning nearly 50 years of albums, EPs, B-sides, and more, this is the full story behind every single song that The Boss has ever released. Moving chronologically through Springsteen’s long career, expert authors Margotin and Guesdon explore everything there is to know about every single song. No stone is left unturned across 670 pages, from the inspiration behind the lyrics and melody to the recording process and even the musicians and producers who worked on each track.

Soar: A Life Freed by Dance by David McAllister

As the middle child in a Catholic family who knew nothing about dance, he watched himself twirl in the reflective glass of the TV and dreamed about becoming the next Rudolf Nureyev. As a little boy taking ballet lessons, he was mercilessly bullied. As a young man joining the ranks of The Australian Ballet, he worried that he would never play the prince because he lacked the height & lean limbs of a classical dancer. 50 years since he stepped into his first ballet class, McAllister reflects on his dance journey, his relationships, embracing his sexuality, his time as principal dancer & 20-year tenure as artistic director of The Australian Ballet. Includes 16 pages of colour photos. ($40, HB)

On Connection by Kae Tempest ($15, PB)

In he first work of non-fiction author, poet and recording artist Kae Tempest offers a meditation on the power of creative connection. Drawing on twenty years’ experience as a writer and performer, she explores how and why creativity—however we choose to practise it—can cultivate greater self-awareness and help establish a deeper relationship to ourselves and the world.

Wagnerism: Art and Politics in the Shadow of Music by Alex Ross ($40, PB)

Around 1900, the phenomenon known as Wagnerism saturated European and American culture. Such colossal creations as The Ring of the Nibelung, Tristan & Isolde & Parsifal were models of formal daring, mythmaking, erotic freedom & mystical speculation. A procession of writers, artists & thinkers, including Charles Baudelaire, Virginia Woolf, Isadora Duncan, Vasily Kandinsky & Luis Buñuel, felt his impact. Anarchists, occultists, feminists & gay-rights pioneers saw him as a kindred spirit. Then Adolf Hitler incorporated Wagner into the soundtrack of Nazi Germany & he came to be defined by his ferocious anti-Semitism. Alex Ross restores the magnificent confusion of what it means to be a Wagnerian—his narrative ranging across artistic disciplines, from architecture to the novels of Philip K. Dick, from the Zionist writings of Theodor Herzl to the civil-rights essays of W. E. B. Du Bois, from O Pioneers! to Apocalypse Now.

Overpaid, Oversexed and Over There

by David Hepworth ($35, PB)

The Beatles landing in New York in February 1964 was the opening shot in a cultural revolution nobody predicted—ushering in a golden era when a generation of kids born in ration card Britain, who had grown up with their nose pressed against the window of America’s plenty, were invited to wallow in their big neighbour’s largesse. Hepworth takes the reader from the Beatles playing Shea Stadium to the Rolling Stones at Altamont, from the Who performing their rock opera at the Metropolitan Opera House to David Bowie touching down in the USA for the first time with a couple of gowns in his luggage.

Jimi Hendrix: The Stories Behind the Songs

by David Stubbs ($40, HB)

David Stubbs provides the definitive companion to Hendrix’s recorded output, from the early years, including Hey Joe and Purple Haze through to his posthumously released trilogy that concluded with Both Sides Of The Sky. Each song of is explored, dissected and celebrated.

Events r Calenda

events

Hi all, Just a short missive from me this month. As you can see we have a stack of Zoom events coming up, and with our shiny new website we’ve automated the process so that you’ll receive the link as soon as you RSVP! If you have missed any of our talks up until this point never fear. One of the major benefits of Zoom has been that it’s much easier to record the events, and I’ve been uploading them to our Gleebooks Author Talks Youtube channel. The wonders of technology, eh?

Otherwise, the new events normal is very much the same as it has been. Although I haven’t been able to see you face-to-face, it’s still been really lovely to see your names pop up on Zoom, and to remember that our events community is still coming together through the pandemic. I hope that you’re all coping o.k at home, and look forward to the days when we can meet again upstairs in the shop.

Till then, James

S S

to watch out for

October 1 Laurie Duggan (with Ella O’Keefe)—Homer Street October 6/7 (TBC) Thomas Mayor Panel— Finding the Heart of the Nation October 8 Nardi Simpson (with Daniel Browning) —Song of the Crocodile October 11 Martin Johnston (with Lex Marinos)—Beautiful Objects October 14 Joyce Kornblatt (with Dr Leah Kaminsky) —Mother Tongue October 15 Christine Jackman (Brigid Delaney) —Turning Down the Noise October 20 Chris Hammer (with Caroline Overington) —Trust October 21 Stuart Rees—Cruelty or Humanity Challenges, Opportunities and Responsibilities October 27 Gail Jones (with Bernadette Brennan) —Our Shadows October 28 Robert Dessaix (with Susan Wyndham) —The Time of Our Lives October 29/30 (TBC) Peter Read & Dennis Foley (with Heather Goodall) —What the Colonists Didn’t Know November 24 Geoff Raby (with Richard McGregor —China’s Grand Strategy & Australia’s Future in the New Global Order

13

Granny’s Good Reads

with Sonia Lee

I read four outstanding crime novels last month: Three Hours by Rosamund Lupton, A Song for the Dark Times by Ian Rankin, The Satapur Moonstone by Sajatur Massey, and The Sandpit by Nicholas Shakespeare.

Three Hours is set in a school in a remote part of Somerset: teachers and students are being held hostage by two unidentified gunmen for a nail-biting ‘180 minutes: 10,800 seconds’. The headmaster has been shot and is lying in the library. Rafi, a teenager who managed to shepherd his little brother Basi out of Syria must now save him again. Hannah, Rafi’s girlfriend, is trapped in the library with the dying headmaster. Camille has to try to keep her class of sevenyear-olds safe in the pottery studio. Sally-Anne, Daphne and the drama class are rehearsing Macbeth in the school theatre. Beth’s son Jamie is somewhere in the school but not answering his mum’s phone calls. DI Rose Polstein, a forensic psychologist, is trying to work out from sparse clues who might have been monstrous enough to plan such an attack. This novel is a nice action-packed thriller, but its overall message, that love and friendship matter more than anything else, is deeper. As Lupton says, ‘you don’t know a person, including yourself, until the everyday is stripped away’. A cogent message for us.

In A Song for the Dark Times Ian Rankin’s sleuth John Rebus is now retired but his professional instincts are still razor-sharp. Unfortunately, his lungs and knees aren’t too good on stairs any more, so Siobhan Clarke helps him to move down to a first-floor apartment. When he’s settled there his daughter Samantha calls to say that her partner Keith has been missing for two days and the local police think that she’s responsible. Leaving Brillo the dog with Siobhan, Rebus takes off for the coast, where the police are less than happy about his involvement.

They want to pin the disappearance on Samantha but Rebus suspects that some ancient history is at the bottom of it all. Keith has been looking into memories of the local WW2 camp for internees, Italian and German, some of whom intermarried with residents after the war. Meantime Siobhan is investigating the murder of a Saudi student where a big real-estate deal is in the mix, and her case and Rebus’s case link up. All very exciting and I hope Rebus lives for ever.

I loved Perveen Mistry, the Oxford-educated lawyer of The Satapur Moonstone.

In 1922, during India’s rainy season, Perveen is asked to go to the remote princely state of Satapur to adjudicate in a dispute between the widowed maharani Mirabai and the dowager maharani Putlabai over the education of ten-year-old Jiva Rao—who has become the new maharaja of Satapur after the unfortunate deaths of the previous maharaja and his elder son. Since the two women are observing purdah, they are inaccessible to Mr Sandringham, the English political agent— so Bombay’s only woman lawyer, Perveen finds that she has been handed a very nasty job: not only does she have to go to the palace in a palanquin which keeps breaking down, leaving her filthy and drenched, but she also suspects that the royal deaths were not natural and that the new maharaja’s life and that of his sister are in danger. She herself dodges an attempted poisoning and that’s the least of it. This is a fascinating book and I hope Perveen comes back again soon.

Meantime I’m chasing up Sajatur Massey’s highly successful first novel The Widows of Malabar Hill.

The Sandpit is set in Oxford—John Dyer has returned with his eleven-year-old son Leandro after many years in Brazil. Leandro attends Dyer’s old school, Phoenix Preparatory, where Dyer makes friends with Rustum Marvar, an Iranian nuclear scientist whose son Samir is, like Leandro, a talented footballer. Marvar, it turns out, has created an algorithm which solves the problem of nuclear fusion, but he doesn’t want to give it to the mullahs, who are keeping his wife hostage in Tehran. Marvar then disappears, having first entrusted his discovery to Dyer.

Nicholas Shakespeare handles suspense well and excels at descriptive passages: in one haunting, idyllic passage he describes the half-term break when Dyer takes Leandro to Lancashire to teach him fly-fishing. The Sandpit is a brilliant literary thriller, once read, never forgotten. It’s my pick of the four.

And—don’t miss The Coal Curse by Judith Brett, and The Medicine by Karen Hitchcock. Both are must-reads. After our recent disastrous bushfires Brett has some axe-grinding to do with deniers of global warming and pollies who seem to prefer fracking to farming. Coal mining, she maintains, is not a large employer and our high dollar has contributed to the decline of manufacturing, so we now have few metal workers left, just as we need them. Karen Hitchcock is everyone’s favourite doctor: she thinks laterally, has empathy, and writes like an angel. She covers a wide variety of topics such as the use of drugs in the treatment of pain, and the overuse of anti-depressants. On her last day in a hospital in Perth, she sits beside a cancer patient who has been given eight months to live.

Holding the patient’s hand, she says: ‘Bev, you still have hundreds of days to live. Go home and live the shit out of them.’ And they both start laughing. Sonia

14

Australian Studies

What Happens Next? Reconstructing Australia after COVID-19

by Emma Dawson & Janet McCalman ($33, PB)

Long before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the global economy, a reset to serve the wellbeing of people & the planet was plainly needed. After the Great Depression & WW2, economic thinking was transformed across the Anglosphere, with a determination to create a more equitable society & support every child, regardless of background, to achieve their full potential. These reforms set us up for decades of prosperity. With contributions from some of Australia’s most respected academics & leading thinkers, What Happens Next? sets out a progressive, post-COVID reforming agenda to tackle the twin crises of climate change & inequality. It provides a framework through which our collective effort can be devoted to improving the lives of all Australians, and the sustainability of the world in which we live.

Red Lead by Roland Perry ($30, PB)

Just after midnight on 1 March 1942, Australia’s most renowned cruiser, HMAS Perth, was sunk by Japanese naval forces in the Sunda Strait off the coast of Java. Of the 681 men aboard, 328 survived the sinking & made it to shore—and one cat. Her name was Red Lead, and she was the ship’s cat, beloved by the crew & by the Perth’s legendary captain Hector Waller. But surviving shellfire, torpedoes & the fierce currents of the Sunda Strait was only the beginning of the terrible trials Red Lead & the surviving crew were to face over the next three-and-a-half years. From Java to Changi & then on the Thai-Burma Railway, Red Lead was to act as a companion, mascot & occasional protector for a small group of sailors who made it their mission to keep her alive in some of the most hellish prison camps on earth.

Mosul: Australia’s secret war inside the ISIS caliphate by Ben Mckelvey ($35, PB)

The book goes from the suburbs of western Sydney & Australia’s military army bases, to the battlefields of Afghanistan & Iraq to tell the story of the battle for Mosul & the secret involvement of Australians on both sides of the war—both our Commandos & Australian ISIS fighters. Ben Mckelvey details the rise of ISIS influence in Australia, the Iran & Australia allegiance to fight Daesh & shows what led up to the battle & the ramifications that are still being felt at home—by our soldiers & the victims of that war. Mckelvey speaks to SOOCOMD/2COMMANDO units, ISOF—Iraq’s premier fighters, Yazidis women who had been slaves of ISIS & returned Commandos & their devastated families, and explains how petty criminals in Western Sydney became some of our worst jihadists who took their families to Iraq to fight for ISIS.

AFA 10: Friends, Allies and Enemies; Asia’s Shifting Loyalties ed Jonathan Pearlman ($23, PB)

Issue 10 looks at Australia’s diplomatic options as loyalties shift in an increasingly turbulent region. Rory Medcalf on the past, present & future of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue. Hugh White on how Australia’s alliances will fare in an Asia shaped by pandemics and power rivalries. Karen Middleton on the most effective way to reboot Australia’s diplomatic efforts in Asia at a tumultuous time.

Allan Behm on why Australia should arrange a Pacific donors conference. Tim Lynch on George Friedman’s The Storm Before The Calm & where the US is standing. Plus regular feature The Fix, on how to solve a key Australian foreign affairs challenge & Richard Cooke dissects key foreign policy terms.

Yornadaiyn Woolagoodja ($35, HB)

This stunning book is a biography & a generous sharing of Yorna’s Culture & traditional beliefs. Explore the meaning of Country, Lalai (‘Creation’), Wandjina, Woongudd (the ‘Snake’), in the author’s Country in the Kimberley region of Western Australia.

Full of extraordinary images of the landscape, rock art, stone arrangements & the artist’s paintings, Yornadaiyn Woolagoodja is a feast for anyone interested in this rich Cultural heritage. There are special feature boxes on Joonba (‘Corroborree’), Native Title, Permisson and Respect, Sugarbag, Ancestors’ Bones, Collecting Turtle & many more.

A Fight For Planet by Craig Reucassel ($35, PB)

Most Australians accept that climate change is real, but many don’t know what to do about it and feel powerless to make a difference.

Craig Reucassel sets out solutions & practical day-to-day changes we can make to reduce our carbon footprint, as well changes our governments need to make without further delay. Find out: Why solar & a thing called Green Power can cut your carbon footprint, even if underfloor heating & hydroponics are your thing; How the government’s substantial investment in discussion papers means we lag behind most of the world when it comes to low-emission cars; How electric cars have more grunt than your average muscle car; Why Australians pay coal mining companies more than $1 billion a year ‘to help with their diesel bills’; How long we could power our homes on the emissions generated by our favourite cuts of beef. Featuring a few shocking statistics to make you sit up & take notice, plus many more pro-active tips & strategies for everyday Australians who want to make a difference.

Moonlite by Garry Linnell ($35, PB)

Born into a privileged life in famine-wracked Ireland, George Scott’s family lost its fortune & fled to New Zealand. There, Scott joined the local militia & fought as a soldier against the Maori in the brutal New Zealand wars. After recovering from a series of serious gunshot wounds, he sailed to Australia and became a Lay Preacher, captivating churchgoers with his fiery & inspiring sermons. He was however prone to bursts of madness, and one night he donned a mask, dubbing himself Captain Moonlite, and robbed a bank before staging one of the country’s most audacious jailbreaks.

After falling in love with fellow prisoner James Nesbitt, a boyish petty criminal desperately searching for a father figure, Scott finds himself unable to shrug off his criminal past. Pursued & harassed by the police, he staged a dramatic siege—preparing for a final showdown with the law, and a macabre executioner without a nose. Told at a cracking pace, and based on many of the extensive letters Scott wrote from his death cell, Moonlite weaves together the extraordinary lives of our bushrangers & the desperation of a young nation eager to remove the stains of its convict past.

Delayed from the June/July Gleaner, now available: Rivers: The Lifeblood of Australia by Ian Hoskins ($50, HB) Living with the Anthropocene: Love, Loss & Hope in the Face of Environmental Crisis (eds) Muir etal ($35, PB) How to Make the World Add Up

by Tim Harford ($33, PB)

Politics

Statistics are vital in helping us tell stories—we see them in the papers, on social media, and we hear them used in everyday conversation—and yet we doubt them more than ever. But numbers—in the right hands—have the power to change the world for the better.

Contrary to popular belief, good statistics are not a trick, although they are a kind of magic. Tim Harford takes us deep into the world of disinformation and obfuscation, bad research & misplaced motivation to find those priceless jewels of data & analysis that make communicating with numbers worthwhile. He reveals how to evaluate the claims that surround us with confidence & a healthy level of scepticism. Using ten simple rules for understanding numbers—plus one golden rule—Harford’s insightful book shows how by thinking carefully about the way numbers are sourced & presented, we can look around us and see with crystal clarity how the world adds up.

The Churchill Complex by Ian Buruma ($30, PB)

It is impossible to understand the last 75 years of British & American history without understanding the Anglo-American relationship, and specifically the bonds between presidents and prime ministers. FDR of course had Churchill; JFK famously had Macmillan, his consigliere during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Reagan found his ideological soul mate in Thatcher, and George W. Bush found his fellow believer, in religion and in war, in Tony Blair. In a series of shrewd character studies, Ian Buruma takes a journey through the special relationship via the fateful bonds between president & prime minister. As the links between the Brexit vote & the 2016 US election are coming into sharper focus, it is impossible to understand the populist uprising in either country without reference to Trump & Boris Johnson, though ironically, they are also the key, Buruma argues, to understanding the special relationship’s demise.

The Climate Crisis and the Global Green New Deal

by Noam Chomsky & Robert Pollin ($30, PB)

The environmental crisis under way is a true existential crisis. Those alive today will decide the fate of humanity. Meanwhile, the leaders of the most powerful state in human history are dedicating themselves with passion to destroying the prospects for organized human life. At the same time, there is a solution at hand, which is the Green New Deal. Putting meat on the bones of the Green New Deal starts with a single simple idea—we have to absolutely stop burning fossil fuels to produce energy within the next 30 years at most; and we have to do this in a way that also supports rising living standards & expanding opportunities for working people & the poor throughout the world. In this book Chomsky & Pollin examine how we can build the political force to make a global Green New Deal a reality.

Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism

by Anne Case & Angus Deaton ($30, PB)

For the white working class, today’s America has become a land of broken families & few prospects. As the college educated become healthier & wealthier, adults without a degree are literally dying from pain & despair. Case & Deaton tie the crisis to the weakening position of labor, the growing power of corporations, and, above all, to a rapacious healthcare sector that redistributes working class wages into the pockets of the wealthy. Capitalism, which over 2 centuries lifted countless people out of poverty, is now destroying the lives of blue collar America.

This book charts a way forward, providing solutions that can rein in capitalism’s excesses & make it work for everyone.

Cruelty or Humanity: Challenges, Opportunities & Responsibilities by Stuart Rees ($35, PB)

Cruelty has long been a feature of states’ domestic and foreign policies but is seldom acknowledged. Governments mouth respect for human rights yet promote discrimination, violence and suppression of critics. Documenting case studies from around the world, distinguished academic and human rights activist Stuart Rees exposes politicians’ cruel motives and the resulting outcomes. Using his first-hand observations and insights from international poets, he argues for courageous action to support non-violence in every aspect of public and private life for the survival of people, animals and the planet.

Why Waste Food? by Andrew F. Smith ($25, PB)

About one-third of all food grown for human consumption is lost or discarded every year, despite financial, environmental and ethical reasons to not waste food. We grow enough food to adequately feed everyone in the world, yet hundreds of millions of people suffer from hunger, malnutrition or food insecurity. Together it accounts for about 8 per cent of the world’s total greenhouse gas emissions. So, if wasting food is such a patently bad idea, why do we discard so much? In Why Waste Food?, Andrew F. Smith investigates one of today’s most pressing topics, examining the causes of avoidable food waste across the supply chain, and highlighting the ways in which we can all do something to tackle this global concern.

Peace in the Age of Chaos by Steve Killelea

Working on an aid program in one of the most violent places in the world, North East Kivu in the DR Congo, philanthropist and business leader Steve Killelea asked himself, ‘What are the most peaceful nations?’ Unable to find an answer, he created the world’s leading measure of peace, the Global Peace Index, which receives over 16 billion media impressions annually and has become the definitive go to index for heads of state. explores the practical application of his work, which is gathering momentum at a rapid pace. In this time when we are faced with environmental, social and economic challenges, this book shows us a way forward where Positive Peace, described as creating the optimal environment for human potential to flourish, can lead to a paradigm shift in the ways societies can be managed, thereby transcending and reinvigorating western democracies. ($35, PB)

Twilight of Democracy: The Failure of Politics & the Parting of Friends by Anne Applebaum

In the years just before & after the fall of the Berlin Wall, conservative politicians & intellectuals across Europe & America celebrated a great achievement, felt a common purpose and, very often, forged personal friendships. The euphoria quickly evaporated, the common purpose & centre ground gradually disappeared & eventually—as Anne Applebaum relates—the relationships soured too. Pulitzer prize winner, Applebaum traces a familiar history buy looking at the trajectories of individuals caught up in the public events of the last 3 decades. When politics become polarized, which side do you back? If you are a journalist, an intellectual, a civic leader, how do you deal with the re-emergence of authoritarian or nationalist ideas in your country? When your leaders appropriate history, or pedal conspiracies, or eviscerate the media & the judiciary, do you go along with it? This is an essay that mixes the personal & the political & brings a fresh understanding to the dynamics of public life in Europe & America, both now & in the past. ($35, PB)

Fuck Neoliberalism: Translating Resistance

by Simon Springer ($33, PB)

Fuck Neoliberalism: Translating Resistance is a worldwide middle finger to the all-encompassing ideology of our era.

Springer’s original essay sparked controversy in the academy when it was first released, and has since spread around the world as enthusiastic rebels translated it into their own languages. This book brings those translations together, accompanied with short essays from each translator that explain the reasons why they translated the text and describes the localised struggles against neoliberalism in their regions.

Behind the Enigma: The Authorised History of GCHQ, Britain’s Secret Cyber Intelligence Agency by John Ferris ($35, PB) You know about MI5. You know about MI6. Now uncover the story behind Britain’s most secretive intelligence agency in the first-ever authorised history of GCHQ. John Ferris has written or edited 8 books & on diplomatic, intelligence, imperial, international, military and strategic history, and strategic studies.

Now in B Format On Fire: The Burning Case for a Green New Deal

by Naomi Klein, $20

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History

If Then: How One Data Company Invented the Future by Jill Lepore ($33, PB)

Decades before Facebook, Google, Amazon & Cambridge Analytica the Simulmatics Corporation, founded in 1959, mined data, targeted voters, accelerated news, manipulated consumers, destabilized politics & disordered knowledge. Silicon Valley likes to imagine it has no past but the scientists of Simulmatics are the long-dead grandfathers of Mark Zuckerberg & Elon Musk. Borrowing from psychological warfare, they used computers to predict & direct human behaviour, deploying their ‘People Machine’ from New York, Cambridge & Saigon for clients that included John Kennedy’s presidential campaign, the New York Times, Young & Rubicam, and, during the Vietnam War, the Department of Defence. Jill Lepore has unearthed from the archives the almost unbelievable story of this long-vanished corporation, to tell story of the original data science hucksters of the 1960s—hilarious, scathing & sobering, it’s a reminder, in the age of Cambridge Analytica & whatever comes next, that we have been here before & should know better.

Ten Days in Harlem: Fidel Castro and the Making of the 1960s by Simon Hall ($30, PB)

New York City, September 1960. Fidel Castro has just arrived for the opening of the UN General Assembly. Castro—in his trademark olive fatigues—receives a rapturous reception from the local African American community, and holds court with political & cultural luminaries including Malcolm X, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Nikita Khrushchev (‘about as welcome to the US as the Black Plague’ —Time), Amiri Baraka & Allen Ginsberg. His fervour in promising the politics of anti-imperialism, racial equality & leftist revolution makes him an icon of the 1960s. In this brilliant slice of modern history, Simon Hall reveals how these 10 days were a crucial hinge point in the trajectory of the Cold War. Encompassing international geopolitics, decolonisation, the nascent Civil Rights & Black Power movements & radical student counterculture.

Pandora’s Jar: Women in the Greek Myths

by Natalie Haynes ($35, PB)

In her retellings passionate classicist, Natalie Haynes takes Pandora and her jar (the box came later) as the starting point to placing the women of the Greek myths on equal footing with the menfolk.

Pandora—the first woman, who according to legend unloosed chaos upon the world—was not a villain, and even Medea & Phaedra have more nuanced stories than generations of retellings might indicate. So, after millennia of stories telling of gods and men, be they Zeus or Agamemnon, Paris or Odysseus, Oedipus or Jason, the voices that sing from Haynes’ pages are those of Hera, Athena & Artemis, and of Clytemnestra, Jocasta, Eurydice & Penelope.

Islamic Empires: Fifteen Cities that Define a Civilization by Justin Marozzi ($25, PB)

Science & Nature

In Search of the Woman Who Sailed the World

by Danielle Clode ($35, PB)

Jeanne Barret, an impoverished peasant from Burgundy, disguised herself as a man & sailed on the 1766 Bougainville voyage as the naturalist’s assistant. Why she left her home to undertake such a perilous journey & what happened when she returned has been shrouded in uncertainty. Biologist Danielle Clode embarks on a journey to solve the mysteries surrounding Jeanne Barret. From archives, herbariums & museums to untouched forests & open oceans, Clode’s mission takes her from France & Mauritius to the Pacific Islands & New Guinea to reveal the previously untold full story of Jeanne’s life as well as the achievements & challenges of her famous voyage.

Livewired: The Inside Story of the Ever-Changing Brain by David Eagleman ($33, PB) How can a blind person learn to see with her tongue or a deaf person learn to hear with his skin? What does a baby born without a nose tell us about our sensory machinery? Might we someday control a robot with our thoughts? And what does any of this have to do with why we dream? The answers to these questions are not right in front of our eyes; they’re right behind our eyes. This book is not simply about what the brain is, but what it does. Covering decades of research to the present day, the book also presents new findings from David Eagleman’s own research, including new discoveries in synaesthesia, dreaming & wearable neurotech devices that revolutionise how we think about the senses.

Ancient Bones by Madelaine BÖhme et al ($35, PB)

Somewhere west of Munich, Madelaine BÖhme & her colleagues dig for clues to the origins of humankind—and discover the fossilised bones of Danuvius guggenmosi. This ancient ancestor’s nearly 12-million-year-old bones were not located in Africa—the so-called birthplace of humanity—but in Europe, and his features suggest we evolved much differently than scientists once believed.

In prose that reads like a gripping detective novel, Ancient Bones interweaves the story of the dig that changed everything with the fascinating answer to a previously undecided and now pressing question- how, exactly, did we become human?

A Life on Our Planet by David Attenborough

I am 93. I’ve had an extraordinary life. It’s only now that I appreciate how extraordinary. As a young man, I felt I was out there in the wild, experiencing the untouched natural world—but it was an illusion. The tragedy of our time has been happening all around us, barely noticeable from day to day—the loss of our planet’s wild places, its biodiversity. I have been witness to this decline. A Life on Our Planet is my witness statement, and my vision for the future. It is the story of how we came to make this, our greatest mistake—and how, if we act now, we can yet put it right. We have one final chance to create the perfect home for ourselves & restore the wonderful world we inherited. ($39.99, HB)

Islamic civilization was once the envy of the world. From a succession of glittering, cosmopolitan capitals, Islamic empires lorded it over the Middle East, North Africa, Central Asia & swathes of the Indian subcontinent. For centuries the caliphate was both ascendant on the battlefield & triumphant in the battle of ideas, its cities A Short History Of The World According To Sheep unrivalled powerhouses of artistic grandeur, commercial power,

by Sally Coulthard ($35, HB) spiritual sanctity & forward-looking thinking. This is a history of From the plains of ancient Mesopotamia to the rolling hills of methis rich & diverse civilization told through its greatest cities over 15 centuries, from the dieval England to the vast sheep farms of modern-day Australia, beginnings of Islam in Mecca in the 7th century to the rise of Doha in the 21st. sheep have been central to the human story. Starting with our Neolithic ancestors’ first forays into sheep-rearing nearly 10,000 years The Infiltrators: The Lovers Who Led Germany’s ago, these remarkable animals have fed us, clothed us, changed Resistance Against the Nazis by Norman Ohler our diet & languages, helped us to win wars, decorated our homes 1935. On a lake near Berlin, a young man is out sailing when he & financed the conquest of large swathes of the earth. Sally Coulglimpses a woman reclining in the prow of a passing boat. Their thard weaves the rich & fascinating story of sheep into a vivid & colourful tapestry, eyes meet—and one of history’s greatest conspiracies is born. thickly threaded with anecdote & ovine facts, whose multiple strands reflect the deep Harro Schulze-Boysen had already shed blood in the fight against penetration of these woolly animals into every aspect of human society & culture.

Nazism by the time he & Libertas Haas-Heye began their whirlwind romance. She joined the cause, and soon the two lovers were The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking) leading a network of antifascists that stretched across Berlin’s boby Katie Mack ($40, HB) hemian underworld. Harro himself infiltrated German intelligence The universe had a beginning—but what happens at the end of & began funnelling Nazi battle plans to the Allies, including the the story? Astrophysicist Katie Mack takes a mind-bending tour details of Hitler’s surprise attack on the Soviet Union. Drawing on through each of the cosmos’ possible finales—the Big Crunch, unpublished diaries, letters and Gestapo files, Norman Ohler spins Heat Death, Vacuum Decay, the Big Rip & the Bounce. Guiding us an unforgettable tale of love, heroism and sacrifice. ($40, HB) through major concepts in quantum mechanics, cosmology, string

special price $32.99

Sealand: The True Story of the World’s Most Stubborn Micronation by Dylan Taylor-Lehman

In 1967, retired army major and self-made millionaire Paddy Roy Bates inaugurated himself ruler of the Principality of Sealand on a World War II Maunsell Sea Fort near Felixstowe—and began the peculiar story of the world’s most stubborn micronation. Having fought off attacks from UK government officials and armed mercenaries for half a century - and thwarted an attempted coup that saw the Prince Regent taken hostage - the self-proclaimed independent nation still stands. Incorporating original interviews with surviving members of the principality’s royal family, and many rare photographs, Dylan Taylor-Lehman recounts the outrageous attempt to build a sovereign kingdom by a family of rogue, larger-than-life adventurers on an isolated platform in the

freezing waters of the North Sea. ($35, HB)

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theory & more, she describes how small tweaks to our incomplete understanding of reality can result in starkly different futures.

Amid stellar explosions, bouncing universes & bubbles of doom Mack shows that even though we puny humans have no chance of changing how it all ends, we can at least begin to understand it.

A Human’s Guide to the Future by Jordan Nguyen Australian biomedical engineer, inventor and visionary Dr Jordan Nguyen explores positive opportunities in science & technology, including robotics, artificial intelligence, bionics, extended reality and avatars— taking a journey through the big innovations being developed around the world, along the fun and amazing rollercoaster of his own adventures—envisaging where our collective future is headed. ($35, PB)

How Birds Behave: Interpreting What They Do and Why by Wenfei Tong ($40, HB)

Birds are intelligent, sociable creatures that exhibit a wide array of behaviours—from mobbing & mimicking to mating & joint nesting.

Wenfei Tong investigates how birds find food, relying on foraging techniques, tools & thievery; the courtship rituals through which birds choose, compete for, woo & win mates; the familial conflicts that crop up among parents, offspring & siblings; and the stresses & strains of nesting—including territory defence, nepotism & relationship sabotage; birds responses to threats & danger through such unique practices as murmurations, specific alarm calls, distraction displays & antipredator nest design. She also looks at how birds change certain behaviours—preening, migration, breeding & huddling—based on climate.

Hot Molecules, Cold Electrons by Paul J. Nahin

Heat, like gravity, shapes nearly every aspect of our world and universe, from how milk dissolves in coffee to how molten planets cool. The heat equation, a cornerstone of modern physics, demystifies such processes, painting a mathematical picture of the way heat diffuses through matter. Paul Nahin vividly recounts the heat equation’s tremendous influence on society, showing how French mathematical physicist Joseph Fourier discovered, derived, and solved the equation in the early 19th century. Nahin then follows Scottish physicist William Thomson, whose further analysis of Fourier’s explorations led to the pioneering trans-Atlantic telegraph cable. This feat of engineering reduced the time it took to send a message across the ocean from weeks to minutes. Thomson also used Fourier’s solutions to calculate the age of the earth. Nahin’s mathematical & scientific explorations can be easily understood by anyone with a basic knowledge of high school calculus & physics, and MATLAB code is included to aid readers who would like to solve the heat equation themselves. ($30, PB)

Philosophy & Religion 200 Words to Help You Talk About Philosophy

by Anja Steinbauer ($20, HB)

Philosophy can be baffling, as well as fascinating, to the best of us. This book is designed to demystify jargon-based philosophic language and make you at ease holding a conversation on the topic.

Anja Steinbauer is the founder of Philosophy For All, co-founder of the London School of Philosophy and is on the editorial team of Philosophy Now magazine. Let her guide you through doubt, dialectic, Dao, and much more in accessible text enabling a quick and easy understanding of various topics while broadening your philosophical vocabulary.

How to Think Like Shakespeare: Lessons from a Renaissance Education by Scott Newstok ($25, PB)

In 14 brief, lively chapters that draw from Shakespeare’s world & works, and from other writers past and present, Scott Newstok distills vital habits of mind that can help you think more deeply, write more effectively, and learn more joyfully, in school or beyond. In this enlightening & entertaining guide to the craft of thought Newstok challenges a host of today’s questionable notions about education, and shows how mental play emerges through work, creativity through imitation, autonomy through tradition, innovation through constraint & freedom through discipline.

On Being Me: A Personal Invitation to Philosophy J. David Velleman ($23, HB)

Reflecting on how daily life presents us with thorny riddles that need working out, moral philosopher J Richard Velleman arrives at unexpected conclusions about survival & personal identity, the self & its future, time & morality, the rationality of regret, free will & personal efficacy, and goodness & love. He shows that we can rely on our own powers of thought to arrive at a better understanding of the most fundamental parts of ourselves—and that the methods of philosophy can help get us there.

Life: A User’s Manual

by Julian Baggini & Antonia Macaro ($35, PB)

Since the beginning of time, people have asked questions about how they should live and, from Ancient Greece to Japan, philosophers have attempted to solve these questions for us. The timeless wisdom that they offer can help us to find our own path. In this insightful, engaging book, renowned existential psychotherapist and philosophical counsellor Antonia Macaro and bestselling philosopher Julian Baggini cover topics such as bereavement, luck, free will and relationships, and guide us through what the greatest thinkers to ever walk the earth have to say on these subjects, from the Stoics to Sartre.

Now in B Format The Weil Conjectures: On Maths and the Pursuit of the Unknown

by Karen Olsson, $23 Novacene: The Coming Age of Hyperintelligence

by James Lovelock, $20

Sick Souls, Healthy Minds: How William James Can Save Your Life by John Kaag ($30, PB)

In 1895, William James, the father of American philosophy, delivered a lecture entitled ‘Is Life Worth Living?’ It was no theoretical question for James, who had contemplated suicide during an existential crisis as a young man a quarter century earlier. Indeed, as John Kaag writes, ‘James’s entire philosophy, from beginning to end, was geared to save a life, his life’. Kaag tells how James’s experiences as one of what he called the ‘sick-souled,’ those who think that life might be meaningless, drove him to articulate an ideal of ‘healthy-mindedness’—an attitude toward life that is open, active, and hopeful, but also realistic about its risks. In fact, all of James’s pragmatism, resting on the idea that truth should be judged by its practical consequences for our lives, is a response to, and possible antidote for, crises of meaning that threaten to undo many of us at one time or another. Along the way, Kaag also movingly describes how his own life has been endlessly enriched by James.

Psychology

Surviving Lockdown: Human Nature in Social Isolation by David Cohen ($28, PB)

From pre-COVID sociable creatures of habit, in 2020 we were forced into a period of uncertainty, restriction & risk, physically separated from families & friends. Psychologist David Cohen, explores the impact of the 2020 quarantine on our relationships, our children, our mental health & our daily lives.

Benedictine monks, hermit popes, Dorothy Sayers, Daniel Defoe (who made the isolated Robinson Crusoe a hero), Sigmund Freud & a rabbi’s angry dog are among the cast of characters he introduces on this whistle-stop tour through plagues in history & brain science, to the importance of introspection & how to make meaning from lockdown.

The Psychology of Stupidity

by Jean-Francois Marmion ($30, PB)

Stupidity is everywhere—from coworkers who won’t stop hitting ‘reply all’ to former school friends Facebooking about conspiracy theories. Jean-Francois Marmion speaks to some of the world’s leading psychologists & thinkers to uncover: why smart people sometimes believe in utter nonsense; how our lazy brains cause us to make the wrong decisions; why trying to debate fools is a trap; how media manipulation & Internet overstimulation makes us dumber; why the stupidest people don’t think they’re stupid. In order to battle idiocy, we must first understand it—this book is a beacon of hope in a world of morons.

The Hidden Habits Of Genius by Craig Wright

Beethoven could not multiply. Picasso couldn’t pass a 4th grade math test. And Steve Jobs left high school with a 2.65 GPA. Why do we teach children to behave & play by the rules, when the transformative geniuses of Western culture have done just the opposite? Craig Wright has devoted more than 2 decades to exploring these questions. Studying those labelled genius, past & present he identifies more than a dozen drivers of genius—characteristics & patterns of behaviour common to great minds throughout history. He argues that genius is about more than intellect & work ethic, and that the ‘eureka’ moment is a Hollywood fiction. Brilliant insights that change the world are never sudden, but rather, they are the result of unique modes of thinking & lengthy gestation.

Most importantly, the habits of mind that produce great thinking & discovery can be actively learned & cultivated, and Wright shows how. ($35, PB)

Out of the Madhouse: From Asylums to Caring Community? by Jeffs & Leggatt ($34.95, PB)

Until the 1990s Larundel Psychiatric Hospital was ‘the madhouse on the edge of town’—a Melbourne cultural icon shrouded in mystery. What was it really like inside this madhouse? Through the voices of former inmates & staff, exposing the best & worst aspects of the mental institutions of the times, this book shows the shifts in psychiatric treatments, the social forces at play, and changes driving mental health policy. It explores what de-institutionalisation & ‘care in the community’ actually meant for those suffering mental illness, as well as for those treating & caring for them. What did we lose with Larundel’s closure & the move to acute psychiatric wards in general hospitals?

Out of My Skull: The Psychology of Boredom

by James Danckert & JohnEastwood ($56, HB)

We avoid boredom at all costs. It makes us feel restless and agitated. This book contends that when we’re bored, we’re failing to satisfy our basic psychological need to be engaged and effective & we become prone to accidents, risky activities, loneliness & ennui, and time-wasting technological distractions. Danckert & Eastwood argue, we can let boredom remind us to become aware & involved—to lead fuller lives.

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never judge a book ...

Cultural Studies & Criticism

It’s a rainy day in Scotland, it’s been raining for days, and the families of holiday makers in cabins around the loch are definitely feeling cabin fever. From the very first page you know something terrible will happen; Sarah Moss’s new book Summerwater keeps the narrative pace going as you follow twelve of these holiday makers—all disparate and unconnected except for the place they find themselves. The tension mounts inexorably through the dense and compelling prose, and while I wasn’t surprised by the end, I was definitely horrified. This is quite a book—as powerful as Moss’s previous Ghost Wall, as lyrical as Tidal Zone, and like both those books, it stays with you.

Less shocking, but still compelling, is Kate Grenville’s new book, A Room Made of Leaves. Set in the first settlement of Sydney, the book is about Elizabeth Macarthur—the intrepid wife of mercurial John Macarthur, and the mother of Australia’s wool industry.

Written as notes and letters by Mrs Macarthur herself, Grenville deftly sets the scene and leads the reader up the garden path with a light touch. I loved all the ovine details, but I did feel modern sensibilities were overlaid on Mrs Macarthur, but perhaps that was a playful device from the author.

We Are All Adults Here by Emma Straub looks like a bit of froth— but while it’s certainly very easy to read, its overarching themes are both contemporary and thought provoking. Astrid Strick is a widow, who has lived a long time in a small town in the Hudson Valley. At the beginning of the book she witnesses a fatal accident which seems to set off a whole series of psychic events for Astrid—starting with a fairly major lifestyle change. Her teenage granddaughter is sent to live with her, and in fact she does seem far more adult than her parents, her aunt and uncle, and even her grandmother. Never judge a book by its cover is the lesson with this book!

Louise

The Time of Our Lives: Growing older well

by Robert Dessaix ($33, HB)

In this exploration of not just the challenges but also the many possibilities of old age, Robert Dessaix roams from Java to Hobart via Berlin, inviting the reader to eavesdrop on his intimate, no-nonsense conversations about ageing with friends & chance acquaintances. Reflecting on time, religion, painting, dancing & even grandchildren, Dessaix takes an enlivening journey across the landscape of growing older.

Riffing on writers & thinkers from Plato to Eva Hoffman, he homes in on the crucial importance of a rich inner life.

Far and Away: The Essential A.A. Gill ($33, PB)

This is the 2nd posthumous collection of A. A. Gill’s journalism. Gill was ferociously well travelled, and once wrote that for all our ability to cross the world at will, ‘abroad is as foreign and funny and strange and shocking as it ever was, and our need to know our neighbours every bit as great’. This is a book about meeting those neighbours. Wherever he was—in London or the Kalahari, Benidorm or Beirut, with the glitterati in St Tropez or the nightclubs of Moscow, in the ruins of earthquakestruck Haiti or in a camp with the displaced Rohingya, he had the ability to pin down the heart of a story and render it unforgettable. A peerless writer about food, you also get to join him at tables all around the world, from a motorway service station cafe to the sophisticated delights of El Bulli.

Kant’s Little Prussian Head and Other Reasons Why I Write by Claire Messud ($30, PB)

Arranged in three parts, opens with Claire Messud’s reflections on a childhood divided between cultures, and between duelling models of womanhood—the seeds of Messud’s inquiry into the precarious nature of girlhood, the role narrative plays in giving shape to a life & the power of language. As the book progresses, these questions translate into Messud’s rich body of criticism. In sections on literature & visual arts, she opens up the ‘radical strangeness’ of childhood in Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go; the search for the self in Saul Friedlander; the fragility & danger of girlhood captured by Sally Mann. Messud returns continually to ‘the tension between form & freedom—the paradox that fierce constraint, or restraint, [that] can allow for the greatest liberty’. As she writes, in a time ‘in which our ideals appear shattered and abandoned’, it is in the return to language and to stories that ‘we return to the essentials that make us human. It is to find the past and the present restored, and with them, the possibility of the future’.

Madman’s Library: The Greatest Curiosities of Literature by Edward Brooke-Hitching ($45, HB)

On Beverley Farmer by Josephine Rowe

‘Across Farmer’s works there has always been an attraction to those beings who occupy two worlds...Once one has lived elsewhere, lived differently, it doesn’t matter whether she stays to forge a new life or turns back towards the old, or moves on once again; there will always be the shadow, the after-image, of the life not lived.’ Beverley Farmer’s writing reflects on restlessness, desire & homecoming. Fellow novelist & short-story writer Josephine Rowe finds a kindred spirit & argues for a reclamation of this unique Australian author. ($18, HB)

A Letter to Layla: Travels to Our Deep Past and Near Future by Ramona Koval ($35, PB)

This is a madman’s library of eccentric & extraordinary volumes from around the world Books written in blood & books that kill, books of the insane & books that hoaxed the globe, books invisible to the naked eye & books so long they could destroy the Universe, books worn into battle, books of code & cypher whose secrets remain undiscovered—and a few others that are just plain weird. From the 605-page Qur’an written in the blood of Saddam Hussein, through the gorgeously decorated 15th-century lawsuit filed by the Devil against Jesus, every strand of strangeness imaginable (and many inconceivable) has been unearthed & bound together for this unique & richly illustrated collection.

News: And How to Use It by Alan Rusbridger

Nothing in life works without facts. A society that isn’t sure what’s true can’t function. Without facts there can be no government or law.

Science is ignored. Trust evaporates. People everywhere feel ever more alienated from—and mistrustful of—news & those who make it.

We are living through a crisis of ‘information chaos’. Former Guardian Editor-in-Chief Alan Rusbridger offers an A-Z guide on how to stay informed in the era of fake news—is a glossary for this bewildering age. From AI to Bots, from Climate Crisis to Fake News, from Clickbait to Trolls (and more), here is the definitive user’s guide for how to stay informed, tell truth from fiction & hold those in power accountable in the modern age. ($25, HB)

How might the origins of our species inform the way we think about our planet? At a point of unparalleled crisis, can human ingenuity save us from ourselves? Ramona Koval travels the globe in a quest to answer these difficult questions. She speaks with an eminent paleo-archaeologist in the Republic of Georgia, meets the next generation of robots in Berlin, attends The Courage to Care: A Call for Compassion a transhumanist conference in California, and explores a cave in southern France

by Christie Watson ($30, PB) before talking with the world’s leading authority on cave art. And throughout, she Christie Watson reveals the remarkable extent of nurses’ work. returns to her quick-witted, ever-engaging youngest granddaughter, Layla, whose We benefit from their expertise in our hospitals & beyond—in our development in infancy spurs Koval to find out what makes us human, what sepaschools, on our streets, in prisons, hospices & care homes. A comrates us from the other apes. munity mental-health nurse choreographs support for a man suffering Raven Smith’s Trivial Pursuits from severe depression. The critical-care team try to save the life of a Is being tall a social currency? Am I the contents of my teen suffering from stab wounds when a visit from his school nurse alfridge? Does yoga matter if you’re not filthy rich? Is a bagel lows him to show his vulnerability. And when a pregnant woman loses four slices of bread? Are three cigarettes a meal? From IKEA frightening amounts of blood following a car accident, it is a military meatballs to minibreaks, join Raven Smith as he reflects on nurse who synchronises the emergency department into immaculate order & focus. Watson the importance we place in the least important things and our makes a further discovery—that, time & again, it is patients & their families—including frivolous attempts to accomplish and attain. He also tackles his her own—who show exceptional strength in the most challenging times. We are all deservsingle-parent upbringing, his struggles as a lonely teenager and ing of compassion, and as we share in each other’s suffering, Watson shows us how we can his personal experience of coming out. From the ‘funniest perfind courage too. The courage to care. son’ on Instagram this exploration of the minutiae of modern life is totally unique & painfully relatable. ($28, HB) Now in paperback—Cold Warriors: Writers Who Waged the

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Literary Cold War by Duncan White, $27

Mantel Pieces: Royal Bodies & Other Writing from The London Review of Books

by Hilary Mantel ($40, HB)

In 1987, when Hilary Mantel was first published in the London Review of Books, she wrote to the editor, Karl Miller, ‘I have no critical training whatsoever, so I am forced to be more brisk & breezy than scholarly.’ This volume collects 20 reviews, essays & pieces of memoir from the 3 decades following. Included are pieces about Robespierre & Danton, the Hite report, Saudi Arabia where Mantel lived for 4 years in the 1980s, the Virgin Mary as well as pop icon Madonna, Helen Duncan, Britain’s last witch, Jane Boleyn, Charles Brandon, Christopher Marlowe & Margaret Pole—illustrating Mantel’s insight into the Tudor mind, and her (in)famous lecture, Royal Bodies, which explores the place of royal women in society & our imagination, plus some of her LRB diaries, including her first meeting with her stepfather and a confrontation with a circus strongman.

special price $34.99

The Gifts of Reading (ed) Jennie Orchard

‘This story, like so many stories, begins with a gift. The gift, like so many gifts, was a book...’ So begins the essay

by Robert Macfarlane that inspired this collection. Published to coincide with the 20th anniversary of global literacy nonprofit, Room to Read, this volume offers irresistible proof of the power & necessity of books and reading. Inspired by Robert Macfarlane, curated by Jennie Orchard—with contributions by: William Boyd, Candice Carty-Williams, Imtiaz Dharker, Roddy Doyle, Pico Iyer, Andy Miller, Jackie Morris, Jan Morris, Sisonke Msimang, Dina Nayeri, Chigozie Obioma, Michael Ondaatje, David Pilling Max Porter, Philip Pullman, Alice Pung, Jancis Robinson, S.F.Said, Madeleine Thien, Salley Vickers, John Wood and Markus Zusak. ($33, PB)

Bunker: Building for the End Times

by Bradley L. Garrett ($40, HB)

Since prehistory, bunkers have been built as protection from cataclysmic social & environmental forces, and as places of power & transformation. Today, the bunker has become the extreme expression of our greatest fears—from pandemics to climate change & nuclear war. And once you look, it doesn’t take long to start seeing bunkers everywhere. Urban explorer & cultural geographer Bradley Garrett explores the global & rapidly growing movement of ‘prepping’ for social & environmental collapse, or ‘Doomsday’. From the ‘dread merchants’ hustling safe spaces in the American mid-West to eco-fortresses in Thailand, from geoscrapers to armoured mobile bunkers, this is a deeply disturbing story from the frontlines of the way we live now—a reflection on our age of disquiet & dread that brings it into a sharp new focus. The bunker is all around us—in malls, airports, gated communities, the vehicles we drive—and it’s in our minds.

Entitled: How Male Privilege Hurts Women

by Kate Manne ($35, PB)

Ranging widely across the culture, from the Kavanaugh hearings & ‘Cat Person’ to Harvey Weinstein & Elizabeth Warren, Kate Manne shows how privileged men’s sense of entitlement—to sex, yes, but more insidiously to admiration, medical care, bodily autonomy, knowledge and power—is a pervasive social problem with often devastating consequences. She argues that male entitlement can explain a wide array of phenomena, from mansplaining & the undertreatment of women’s pain to mass shootings by incels & the seemingly intractable notion that women are ‘unelectable’. We are all implicated in toxic masculinity—it’s not just a product of a few bad actors; it’s something we all perpetuate, conditioned as we are by the social & cultural currents of our time.

The Book in the Cathedral: The Last Relic of Thomas Becket by Christopher de Hamel

The assassination of Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral on 29 December 1170 inspired the largest pilgrim site in medieval Europe & many works of literature from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales to T. S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral & Anouilh’s Becket. In a brilliant piece of historical detective work, Christopher de Hamel here identifies the Anglo-Saxon Psalter which Becket cherished throughout his time as Archbishop of Canterbury & which he may well have been holding when he was murdered. ($27, HB)

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The Art of Easter Island by Thor Heyerdahl ($75, HB) This is the full, documented result of Ethnologist and Adventurer, Thor Heyerdahl’s explorations on Easter Island. Native name Rapa Nui, Easter Island is a volcanic island located halfway between Polynesia and South America. It is one of the remotest, inhabited islands anywhere. First discovered by Europeans in 1722, it is famed for archaeological sites, including nearly 900 moai (carved human figures with oversize heads)—monumental statues created by the island’s inhabitants during the 13th–16th centuries. In 1955, Thor Heyerdahl bought a team of American and Norwegian archaeologists to the Island and undertook a comprehensive, sixmonth archaeological survey. This book is the documented review of these discoveries. It includes: ‘The dramatic discovery of art treasures in secret caves. The mystery of the great stone men: why and how they were carved, transported and raised. The historical and religious meaning of the art of Easter Island revealed.’

New findings on the ancient and later history of the island and its people.

Heyerdahl (1914–2002) had gained worldwide fame eight years previously. He believed that ancient people from the Americas could have colonized Polynesia, rather than Polynesians from the western Pacific. His theory that the Pacific had been settled by accidental drift voyaging was based on the wind and current patterns in the Pacific. Academic specialists scoffed at the theory—so, in 1947 Heyerdahl, with five companions and a pet parrot, took a balsa-log raft named Kon-Tiki on a 6,900 km on a voyage from Peru to islands east of Tahiti—related in his classic account The Kon Tiki Expedition (1948).

POSTSCRIPT: Genetic analysis of Polynesians and Native South Americans, published in the British scientific journal, Nature in July 2020, has revealed that several eastern Polynesian populations have signs of an ancient genetic signature that originated from Native South American people. An initial admixture event between Native South Americans and Polynesians, discovered by statistical analysis, took place around AD 1150–1230. So, some 63 years after he risked his life to prove a widely derided theory, Thor Heyerdahl may be proven right.

Venice for Pleasure by J. G. Links ($15, PB) ‘[My] object is to guide the reader to places he might otherwise miss and, having reached them to tell him what he might wish to know and then leave him there to admire, to enjoy or, perhaps, to be disappointed. This 6th revised edition includes Venice for Children’s Pleasure & The Delights of the Brenta. A minor classic, ‘Not only the best guide-book to that city ever written, but the best guide-book to any city ever written.’—Bernard Levin The Times. The illustrations show the visitor, as he confronts a view, what his predecessors of 100, 200 or 500 years ago saw from the same point. The main part of the book describes four walks, each of which can be completed in one day, with points in each at which one can break off & return another day. Maps, old & new are provided for each walk One River: Explorations & Discoveries in the Amazon Rainforest by Wade Davis ($15, PB)

In 1941, Richard Evans Schultes took a leave of absence from Harvard University & disappeared in to the Northern Amazon of Colombia (what a way to avoid a World War!). The world’s leading authority on the hallucinogens and medicinal plants of the region, Schultes returned after 12 years of travelling through South America in a dug-out canoe, mapping uncharted rivers, living among local tribes and documenting the knowledge of shamans. 30 years later, his student Wade Davis landed in Bogota to follow in his mentor’s footsteps—so creating an epic tale of undaunted adventure, a compelling work of natural history and testament to the spirit of scientific exploration.

Meetings with Remarkable Men by G. I. Gurdjieff ($15, PB) Spiritual teacher G. I. Gurdjieff travelled through Central Asia & the Middle East— in this book he vividly describes his encounters with the people who aided his search for knowledge: his father, a bard, who handed down to him tales of wonder & magic; a Russian prince dedicated to the truth; a Persian dervish who taught him a new way of living; a woman who escaped slavery to become a trusted fellow seeker.

Dear Reader by Cathy Rentzenbrink

Growing up Cathy Rentzenbrink was rarely seen without her nose in a book and read in secret long after lights out. When tragedy struck, books kept her afloat. Eventually they lit the way to a new path, first as a bookseller and then as a writer. No matter what the future holds, reading will always help. This is a moving, funny and joyous exploration of how books can change the course of your life, packed with recommendations from one reader to another. ($33, PB)

19

Golden Age Mysteries Fireball: Carole Lombard & the Mystery of Flight 3

by Robert Matzen ($34, PB) At 7.07pm, 16 January 1942, TWA Flight 3 took off from Las Vegas en route to Los Angeles. On board were famed Hollywood actress Carole Lombard, her mother Bessie Peters, MGM Press Agent Otto Winkler and nineteen other people—including 15 Army Air Corps trainees and three air crew. Thirteen minutes later, the plane levelled at 8300 ft and travelling at 180 mph, smashed into the granite cliff of Mt Potosi, 32 miles southwest of Las Vegas. It hit with such force that wreckage is still embedded there nearly eight decades later. The crash fireball was seen from 40 miles away. The rugged terrain quickly challenged any thoughts of rescue.

Even horses couldn’t make it to the site; it was necessary to climb by hand through a steep boulder strewn ravine. The first rescuers reached the crash site the next morning: “It looked for all the world like the city dump. Luggage everywhere; the twisted fuselage of the plane, a tangled mass of aluminium, wires and cables, seats, shattered glass, random hunks of engine, and melted rubber. Wedged in here and there were passengers, or rather, what was left of passenger.’ The bodies were badly burnt. Lombard was identified only by her blonde hair. She died aged 33.

Lombard was the ‘Queen of Hollywood Comedy’. In 1939, the ‘Queen’ married the ‘The King’—Clark Gable—who she eloped with while he was filming Gone with the Wind. In 1941, with America having entered WWII, Lombard was recruited to sell war bonds in her home state of Indiana. The War Department had barred stars on bond tours from travelling by air so Lombard did most of the trip by train, stopping at various locations on the way to Indianapolis and raising over two million dollars for the war effort. Having reached Las Vegas, Lombard was eager to return home for the premiere of her new film comedy, To Be or Not to Be. She flipped a coin to decide if they should travel by plane—and won the toss.

Gable was utterly distraught upon hearing the news of the crash. He reached the mountain and hysterical with grief, attempted to climb to the site himself. He was physically restrained by good friend, Spencer Tracy. Matzen relates the stories of the crew & passengers, and also details the experiences of those who searched for the plane and helped recover the bodies. He examines the crash itself is examined from every aspect using interviews, government documents and a personal climb to the site—why on a clear night did an experienced pilot, flying a 10-month-old aircraft crash into that Nevada mountainside miles off course? No official cause was ever given. Matzen looks into all possibilities. The mystery remains.

Ice Cream Blonde: The Whirlwind Life & Mysterious Death of Screwball Comedienne Thelma Todd

by Michelle Morgan ($60, HB) ‘Thelma Todd’s death will never be solved and the rest who were at the party had better KEEP THERE (sic) TRAPS SHUT. Or something else will happen.’—An anonymous missive sent to Hollywood director Roland West on 24 December 1935.

Eight days earlier, 29-year-old actress Thelma Todd, his former lover and business partner was found dead in her 1932 Lincoln convertible parked in the garage of Jewel Carmen, West’s former wife.

Thelma Todd (1906-1935) who went by the nickname ‘The Ice Cream Blonde’ and ‘Hot Toddy’, appeared in over 120 feature films between 1926 and 1935. She was a beloved comedienne who worked with—among many others—Jimmy Durante, Buster Keaton, Laurel and Hardy and the Marx Brothers. Watch her wonderful performance opposite Groucho in Horse Feathers (1932). She was also a rare Golden Age star who successfully crossed over from silent films to the ‘talkies’.

In 1934, Todd opened Thelma Todd’s Sidewalk Café, at 17575 Pacific Coast Highway, Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles. It rapidly became a hot spot that attracted a diverse clientele—fans, tourists, celebrities and the ‘after-hours set’. Despite film and business success, the following year began ominously for the actress. A mysterious extortionist, known as the Ace, sent her a series of increasingly threatening letters from February onwards. One read: ‘Pay $10,000 to Abe Lyman (one of Thelma’s ex-boyfriends) in New York by March 5 and live. If not our San Francisco boys will lay you out. This is no joke.’ In June, her house was broken into and ransacked with valuable clothing and perfumes stolen. On 14 December 1935, Thelma had attended a party at The Cafe Trocadero nightclub. She was last seen by her chauffeur walking up the hillside stairs to her apartment, above her Cafe at around 2am on 15 December 1935. Murder or accidental death—the autopsy report showed death by carbon monoxide poisoning, yet Thelma’s injuries were rumoured to be more serious than disclosed and suggested strangulation. This very readable, fresh examination provides a very suggestive—but not conclusive—solution of one of Hollywood’s Golden Age mysteries. Stephen Reid

20

Poetry

How to Fly (In Ten Thousand Easy Lessons)

by Barbara Kingsolver ($30, PB)

Barbara Kingsolver’s generous collection is divided into thematic sections that loop and interweave to form a carefully patterned whole: a series of ‘How to’ poems that smartly balance tongue-in-cheek pragmatism with revelatory wisdom, a complicated yet affirmative family pilgrimage to Italy, cherished childhood memories, the perils and pleasures of being a [female] writer, elegies to lost loved ones, and elegies to the planet.

The Anthology of Australian Prose Poetry (eds) Paul Hetherington & Cassandra Atherton

Cassandra Atherton & Paul Hetherington have gathered a broad & representative selection of the best Australian prose poems written over the last 50 years. This volume includes many distinguished prose poets; Jordie Albiston, Joanne Burns, Gary Catalano, Anna Couani, Alex Skovron, Samuel Wagan Watson, Ania Walwicz & many more; and documents prose poetry’s growing appeal over recent decades, from the poetic margins to the mainstream. ($40, PB)

The Fire of Joy: Roughly 80 Poems to Get by Heart and Say Aloud (ed) Clive James ($35, PB) This is Clive James’ desert island poems: a selection of his favourite verse and a personal commentary on each. The final book James completed before his death in 2019, his main purpose is to provide ammunition that will satisfy your urge to discover, learn & declaim verse. As well as his selection of poems, James’ commentaries offer either a biographical, historical or critical introduction to the poem, or a more personal anecdote about the role a particular poem has played in James’ life.

2am Thoughts by Makenzie Campbell ($23, PB)

2am Thoughts condenses an entire relationship, with all its untamed emotions & experiences, into a single day. As the long hours of the night drag on, we experience the obsession, fear, neuroticism, and the deep, universal longing for love. Similar to Rupi Kaur’s Milk and Honey, 2am Thoughts is 150 pages of stand alone poems and illustrations, with an easy to read, unpolished style that makes it perfect for both traditional & younger generation readers.

Nothing to Declare by Mags Webster ($25, PB)

‘Alive, passionate and on the move—these poems range through worlds of wide reading, inner and outer journeying, through both the historic and the personal past and present, the fleshly and the vegetal. Always alert to ‘terrible Aphrodite’ in their swing between blazon and contreblazon, they make ‘pauses in transit’ with great precision of image and feeling.

Subtle and confronting at the same time, these are the fruits of a startling talent.’ — Tracy Ryan.

Hope Blossoming in their Ink

by Jean Garrido-Salgado ($25, PB)

This is Juan Garrido-Salgado’s sixth poetry collection published in Australia. Written over more than ten years in his new home, in each of the three sections of this volume you will hear the sound of broken humanity through a poetical voice which shares verses of the struggle for justice, peace and a revolution, and bear witness to the blossoming of GarridoSalgado’s new life of thirty years in this land.

Dead Bolt by Ella Jeffery ($25, PB)

Winner of the Puncher & Wattmann Prize for a First Book of Poems. ‘As its title suggests, Dead Bolt is a meditation on home and its ability to become suddenly unhomely or uncanny. Ella Jeffery’s poetry ranges from the plangent and elegiac to the comic and satirical. It attends to both the eye and the ear; its extraordinary imagery is matched by a marvellous attention to poetry’s sonic capacity. Dead Bolt is a compelling, exquisitely realised debut.’ — David McCooey

Harbour by Kate Llewellyn ($19.95, PB)

‘Art is always like this Mysterious as light.’ Quiet and insightful, raw in its simplicity, this collection of poems from Kate Llewellyn, written between the years of 2000 to 2019, examines a life well lived, dipping in and out of memory to tell a tale of small moments and the wisdom of growing old. In the poem Harbour she touches on what is lost and gained in growing up, The Big Nothing draws readers along on a journey to view the world through another’s eyes, and What They Said brings forth a cacophony of voices, opinions and dreams across a lifetime. Moving, profound and often joyful, this collection is a must-have for all Kate Llewellyn fans.

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Fox 8: A Story George Saunders, HB

Every Time I Find the Meaning of Life, They Change It Daniel Klein, HB

The Immortalists Chloe Benjamin, HB

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There’s a Mystery There: The Primal Vision of Maurice Sendak Jonathan Cott, HB

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The Last Fisherman: Witness to the Engangered Oceans Unseen Extremes: Mapping the The Modern Explorers Rotman & Harel, HB World’s Greatest Mountains (ed) Robin Hanbury-Tenison, HB Stefan Dech et al, HB

Was $50

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Now $16.95 The End of Europe: Dictators, Demagogues, and the Coming Dark Age James Kirchick, HB

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Hell and Good Company: The Spanish Civil War and the World it Made Richard Rhodes, HB

The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia Masha Gessen, HB

A History of Cycling in 100 Objects Suze Clemitson, HB

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Turkey: A Short History Norman Stone, PB

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Artful Lives—Edward Weston, Margrethe Mather, and the Bohemians of Los Angeles Beth Gates Warren, HB

Chinese Lives: The People who Made a Civilization Victor H. Mair et al, HB

Boys in the Trees: A Memoir Carly Simon, HB

This Way Madness Lies: The Asylum and Beyond Mike Jay, HB

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The Vietnam War Ken Burns & Geoffrey Ward, HB

Jackson Pollock’s Mural David Anfam, HB

Round the World in Eighty Dishes Maison Kayser’s French Pastry Workshop, HB Lesley Blanch, HB

21

The Arts

The Lives of Lucian Freud: FAME 1968–2011

by William Feaver ($70, HB)

William Feaver, Lucian Freud’s collaborator, curator & close friend, knew the unknowable artist better than most. Over many years, The American Society of Botanical Artists offers a beautifully Freud narrated to him the story of his life, ‘our novel’. This 2nd illustrated & comprehensive guide to one of the most delicate volume follows Freud at the height of his powers, painting the most art forms. This essential reference features how-to tutorials for iconic works of his career in a constant & dissatisfied pursuit of perall the major techniques: pen & ink, watercolour, coloured penfection, just outrunning his gambling debts & tailor’s bills. Whether cil, egg tempera, oil, acrylic, gouache, silverpoint & etching. tattooing swallows at the base of Kate Moss’s back or exacting a The tutorials move from basic & introductory to advanced, so strange & horrible revenge on Jerry Hall & Mick Jagger, Freud’s the reader can build on their skills as they progress. Additional information includes a adventures were always perfectly characteristic. An enfant terrible till the detailed overview of the necessary materials, basic information about the principles of end, even as he was commissioned to paint the Queen & attended his own retrospeccomposition & advice on how to develop a personal style. Filled with 900 photographs. tives, what emerges is an artist wilfully oblivious to the glitter of the world around—focussed instead on painting first and last.

Chanel Catwalk: The Complete Collections This definitive publication features a concise history of Karl LaRembrandt’s Orient: West Meets East in Dutch gerfeld & Virginie Viard’s time at Chanel as well as brief bioArt of the 17th Century by Ortrud Westheider graphical profiles of each designer. The collections (from Haute In the 17th century, Amsterdam was a vibrant hub of the burCouture and Ready-to-Wear to Cruise and Métier d’arts) are orgeoning European trade with Asia, Africa, and the Levant, imganized chronologically. Each one is introduced by a short text porting copious amounts of foreign items that powerfully stimuunveiling its influences & highlights & illustrated with catwalk lated the imagination of numerous Dutch artists. Rembrandt, images, showcasing hundreds of spectacular clothes, details, whose curiosity and voraciousness as a collector were legendary accessories, beauty looks & set designs—and the top fashion in his time. Throughout his prolific career, he drew on Eastern models who wore them on the runway. A rich reference section, influences in genres as diverse as history painting & portraiincluding an extensive index, concludes the book. ($100, HB) ture, including depictions in which he himself adopted Oriental Journeys in Natural Dyeing: Techniques for styled attire. This lavishly illustrated book explores the inventive ways in which Rembrandt & his contemporaries accommodated Eastern imagery into their own Creating Colour at Home ($45, HB) repertoire, set within the wider context of Holland’s rapidly expanding commercial and The time honoured traditions explored in this book have deep cultural exchange with its non-European trading partners. ($105, HB) connections to the cultures from which they stem, and Kristine Vejar & Adrienne Rodriguez, through their exploration of Raphael: The Life of a Genius worldwide dyeing practices, compare & contrast how people

by Anna Cerbonie Baiardi ($90, HB) create colour—in a multitude of shades, tones & varietals— Raphael was an artist ahead of his time, both as a painter & in the showcasing that the art of creating colour is filled with endway he managed his studio: he acted as an entrepreneur, creatless possibility. Their book features a number of new dyeing ing a modern organisation with an excellent group of collaboratechniques along with detailed recipes & projects to replicate tors. His inventions & ideas spread widely, thanks to engravings at home. & woodcuts. So, even in his lifetime, Raphael gained renown Hideout: Cabins, Shacks, Barns, Sheds ($55, HB) with critics & collectors. This volume explores the full range Cabins have become one of the favourite hiding places for of his work—from his altar pieces, to the frescos in the Vatican people looking for a perfect place to rest and connect with Rooms, to the narratives in the Vatican Loggias, to his tapestries nature. Environmentally friendly homes, cutting-edge sustainfor the Sistine Chapel—with detailed closeups & preliminary sketches & able architecture that have ecological solutions & a low envistudies. It also delves into the myth of the painter protected & promoted by the Acaronmental impact. Buildings with smart & compact design, in demia Raffaello, and his influence on the Italian & European artists who followed him. which the spaces are open & shared, connected to each other and to the environment.

Botanical Art Techniques ($53, HB)

Seasonal Slow Knitting: Thoughtful Projects for a Handmade Year by Hannah Thiessen

Slow Knitting introduced crafters to a process of more mindful making through five basic tenets: source carefully, make thoughtfully, think seasonally, experiment fearlessly, and explore openly. This seasonal approach encourages knitters to delve deeper into those concepts, applying them to everyday making through a series of essays, projects & patterns that explore the life of a knitter throughout the year. Organized like a seasonal planting guide or farmer’s almanac, each chapter and section is designed to identify and encourage small ways that knitters may begin to employ noticeable change: organizing your yarn stash, carving out time for knitting &starting on that baby blanket in a timely manner. ($45, HB)

365 Days of Drawing by Lise Herzog

You want to learn to draw. You know you have to practice. Every day. But it is that blank sheet of paper that sets off the ‘what do I draw?’ and ‘I don’t know how to draw it!’ panic. This book offers a step-by-step drawing exercise for every day of the year. Each exercise shows the steps from the first line to the last and a brief text explains the steps. All 365 drawings start with one shape or line - a circle, an oval, a square, a rectangle, a curved line, a straight line - upon which the object or person is built. By mixing these basic strokes anything is achievable. For the beginner or for those with experience to polish their skills. ($35, HB)

Open Studio: Do-It-Yourself Art Projects by Contemporary Artists ($125, HB)

by Sharon C. Hurowitz & Amanda Benchley

Open Studio goes behind closed doors with a host of prominent visual artists to capture them in the act of creation as they draw, paint, sculpt, or design an original project for readers to then recreate themselves at home. Showcasing the artists’ working environments & specific processes, this innovative book leads you step-by-step through each artist’s project and supplies with pull-out templates and other essential elements. The result is sure to inspire people everywhere to blaze their own creative trails.

22

Language & Writing

Creativity: A Short and Cheerful Guide

by John Cleese ($20, HB)

Creativity is usually regarded as a mysterious, rare gift that only a few possess. John Cleese shows that creativity is a skill that anyone can acquire in this short, practical & often amusing guide.

Drawing on his lifelong experience as a writer, he shares his insights into the nature of the creative process, offering advice on how to get your own inventive juices flowing. What do you need to do to get yourself in the right frame of mind? When do you know that you’ve come up with something that might be worth pursuing? What do you do if you think you’ve hit a brick wall?

He explains the way your mind works as you search for inspiration, and that, regardless of the task, you can learn to be better at coming up with a promising idea, refining it & knowing when you’re ready to act on it.

Word for Today by Roly Sussex ($25, PB)

Did you know that the word salary comes from the Latin sal for ‘salt’, since part of the payment to Roman soldiers was in salt?

That braces and suspenders used to refer to different items of clothing? Or that trolls have migrated from fairytales to online discussion forums? The English language is currently going through a period of tremendous ferment, growth & expansion. Old ‘rules’ are being challenged, or weakened. New ones are emerging. And mistakes & misuses are popping up with all the speed that the internet can provide. Linguist Roly Sussex offers the best of his reflections on word origins, neologisms & misuses as documented on his popular weekly ABC Radio program Word for Today.

Rebel Without A Clause by Sue Butler ($25, PB)

We invent new words & phrases, we mash up idioms, we mispronounce, misuse, misappropriate. Lexicographer and former Macquarie Dictionary Editor Sue Butler has heard it all & is ready to defend & disagree with common usage. Veering from tolerance to outrage, she examines how the word sheila took a nose-dive after WWII, considers whether we should hunker or bunker down, and bemoans the emptiness of rhetoric. She shouts ‘down with closure’ as it leaps from the psychoanalyst’s couch, explains why we’ve lost the plot on deceptively, untangles the manuka honey stoush, fathoms why the treatment of famous is infamous, and ponders whether you would, could or should ... Rebel without a Clause is a fascinatingly idiosyncratic romp through the world of words.

what we're reading

Stef: Death at the Chateau Bremont by ML Longworth—I have to thank Roger Mackell for recommending this delightful mystery series set in Aix-en-Provence and surrounding areas. I might not have been able to enjoy my planned French holiday, however through my reading this year I have travelled far and wide across this beautiful country. Death at the Chateau Bremont is the first in a series of nine mysteries with the delightful Judge Verlaque & Professor Marine Bonnet. And like many of my favourites of the genre, the love of food and wine, the sense of place and the beauty of the setting is just as important to the story as the mystery—ML Longworth delivers this in spades! From the moment the first death is discovered at the Chateau the pressure is on Judge Verlaque to find the truth behind what looks like an accident but raises more questions than answers. As he winds his way along the picturesque tree lined roads to the Chateau you are taken on a journey not only to solve the mystery, but to see the sights, the boutique wineries, the churches and monasteries along the way. When Verlaque questions the caretaker of the Chateau you are embraced with a way of life, and when he returns to Aix to gather facts you can feel the bustle of the busy streets, see the flickering shadows cast by the avenue of plane trees along Cours Mirabeau. Verlaque must unravel the family secrets to find the truth and in a small town like Aix everybody knows something. Thoroughly enjoyable—I’m now I ready for Book 2, Murder in the Rue Dumas. ($27) Victoria: Mother Tongue by Joyce Kornblatt—I am not giving the story away when I tell you this is about a baby that is stolen from hospital three days after she is born - it is the first thing you read when you open this fabulous book. Narrated by the stolen girl, you are taken backwards and forwards through the lives of all the main characters to give you insight as to why, and that all-time question...is it nature or nurture that forms us?

Written with compassion and sensitivity—this is a captivating story that I could not put down. ($29.95)

Andrew: Beyond Black by Hilary Mantel—A dark as pitch suburban comedy of a medium & her assistant/manager. They traverse the outer suburbs of London & the home-counties, performing in dingy pubs, clubs and community halls. A slow-burn corker of a book; deft prose and, ultimately, a staggeringly awful, sad and vicious inspection of what lies hidden beneath the surface of suburban life. ($23)

Anna: You People by Nikita Lalwani—This really opened my eyes to yet another aspect of what it means to no longer have a home. It’s an affecting depiction of characters on the move, as they search or somewhere that they can live without fear. ($35)

Viki: Squeeze Me by Carl Hiaasen—After a couple of not-so-good outings, Carl Hiaasen is back. As is his one-eyed road-kill gourmet eco-terrorist, ex-governor Clinton Tyree aka Skink—back to wreak eco-vengeance on the President’s Palm Beach ‘Winter Palace’ with an infestation of giant Burmese pythons. This is vintage Hiaasen screwball crime with a colourful cast including an estranged & straying first couple, crazy rich Republicans, dull-witted petty crims & dope fiends, put-upon cops & secret service agents, a malfunctioning tanning bed, and a classic Hiaasen heroine—wildlife wrangler, Angie Armstrong—owner & lone staffer of Discreet Captures. Fake news? Deep state hoax? Great fun! ($33) Morgan: Sorrow & Bliss by Meg Mason— Emblazoned across the cover of this funny and sad book is a comparison to Phoebe WallaceBridge’s Fleabag. For once, the hype is not an exaggeration. A love story seen through the eyes of the annoying, funny, vulnerable Martha, who is eventually diagnosed with a mental illness, this book will make you laugh and cry.

This is, for want of a better description, high quality, contemporary, chick lit for Millennials to Gen X—and this boomer loved it. ($33)

Elissa: Piranesi by Susanna Clarke—If you’ve read Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell you’ll know what to expect—a beautiful mix up of philosophy, magic and that lovely Clarke touch of humour and academia. After a slow and curious beginning Piranesi evolves into a beautifully wrought story of one person’s struggle to understand their place in the world. I was entirely satisfied by Clarke’s foray into a compact & deftly written novel. (If you haven’t read Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, why not?) ($28)

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Jonathon: Blindness by Jose Saramago—This is one of the books that won Saramago the Nobel Prize. He tells his stories with one voice, through long airy sentences—as though Saramago himself is breathlessly recounting his characters’ predicaments to you—and with rich allusion to literature that I’m sure different readers will find their own gems in. Blindness is a brutal dystopia that gets very dark very fast—perhaps one for the brave. ($15)

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gleaner

is a publication of Gleebooks Pty. Ltd. 49 Glebe Point Rd, (P.O. Box 486) Glebe NSW 2037 Ph: (02) 9660 2333 Fax: (02) 9660 3597 books@gleebooks.com.au

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The gleebooks gleaner is published monthly from February to November with contributions by staff, invited readers & writers.

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Bestsellers—Non-Fiction 1. Flavour

Yotam Ottolenghi

2. The Golden Maze: A Biography of Prague

Richard Fidler

3. Intimations

Zadie Smith

4. The Carbon Club

Marian Wilkinson

5. Phosphorescence

Julia Baird

6. Women & Leadership: Real Lives, Real Lessons

Julia Gillard & Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala

7. Dark Emu

Bruce Pascoe

8. People of the River: Lost Worlds of Early Australia

Grace Karskens

9. The Happiest Man on Earth

Eddie Jaku

10. When America Stopped Being Great: A History of

the Present

Nick Bryant

Bestsellers—Fiction 1. The Yield

Tara June Winch

2. The Lying Life of Adults

Elena Ferrante

3. A Room Made of Leaves

Kate Grenville

4. A Lonely Girl is a Dangerous Thing 5. Girl, Woman, Other 6. The Dictionary of Lost Words 7. Mayflies 8. The Thursday Murder Club 9. The Last Migration 10. The Labyrinth

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Jessie Tu

Bernadine Evaristo Pip Williams Andrew O’Hagan Richard Osman Charlotte McConaghy Amanda Lohrey

and another thing.....

Is it a sign of COVID comfort eating or a relaxing of gender roles that the biggest seller on Father’s Day was Ottolenghi’s new book Flavour?

It’s certainly a long way from golf socks and power tools. There’s lots I want to read this month. First the new Jess Walters book, Cold Millions. Walters is a great writer and he ranges over many genres—from a non-fiction about Ruby Ridge, a dismantling of the serial killer in Over Tumbled Graves, to a love story set in 60s Hollywood & the Italian Riviera—Beautiful Ruins. His latest takes on survival during the Great Depression era—a timely choice. On the crime pages I’m tempted by the new John Grisham, and Chris Lloyd’s The Unwanted Dead. For a bit of armchair travel ,Norwegian author, Erika Fatland’s journey around the borders of Russia is calling to me. And on the Australian Studies pages, it’s Roland Perry’s tale of Red Lead, the ill-fated HMAS Perth’s cat and Garry Linnell’s book about gay bushranger Capt. Moonlite for me. At the moment I’m reading Pandora Sykes’ series of essays how do we know we’re doing it right—yet another entertaining and incredibly articulate millennial riffing on modern life. I look forward to one essay a day when I get home from work, and am enjoying her writing so much I’m thinking that I’ll have to have a look at her podcast partner Dolly Alderton’s debut novel, Ghosts—following Morgan’s boomer dive into millennial chick lit. My other daily browse is Neil MacGregor’s A History of the World in 100 Objects. I’ve been doing a couple of objects a day and am finding it a strangely comforting counter to my conviction that we humans are a plague upon the earth. If I ever get another opportunity to visit the British Museum, MacGregor’s book will most definitely be my companion. Viki

For more October new releases go to:

Main shop—49 Glebe Pt Rd; Ph: (02) 9660 2333, Fax: (02) 9660 9842. Open 7 days, 9am to 9m Thur–Sat; 9am to 7pm Sun–Wed Sydney Theatre Shop—22 Hickson Rd Walsh Bay; Open two hours before and until after every performance Blackheath—Shop 1 Collier’s Arcade, Govetts Leap Rd; Ph: (02) 4787 6340. Open 7 days, 9am to 6pm Blackheath Oldbooks—Collier’s Arcade, Govetts Leap Rd: Open 7 days 10am to 5pm Dulwich Hill—536 Marrickville Rd Dulwich Hill; Ph: (02) 9560 0660. Open 7 days, Tue–Sat 9am to 7pm; Sun–Mon 9 to 5 www.gleebooks.com.au. Email: books@gleebooks.com.au; oldbooks@gleebooks.com.au