Biography and memoir
Get Up Mum by Justin Heazlewood
Justin Heazlewood’s debut memoir launches the reader into the seemingly innocent world of a pre-pubescent boy in 1990s Australia. Giddy with joy, twelve-year-old Heazlewood meticulously details the small events that cause a child so much excitement – athletics carnivals, getting…
Out of the Forest by Gregory P. Smith
Gregory P. Smith was born into a life of violence. At home he was a witness to, and a victim of, his alcoholic father’s physical abuse, and his speed-addled mother’s vicious criticism. Before long, his dysfunctional parents send him to…
Calypso by David Sedaris
‘LOL’ is an acronym I usually avoid, however, when reading David Sedaris it is apt. Calypso, the long-awaited new collection of twenty-one stories from one of the world’s most-loved humorists is an absolute cracker!
Focusing on middle age, mortality…
There Are No Grown-Ups by Pamela Druckerman
I love Pamela Druckerman’s writing. Her last book, French Children Don’t Throw Food, was, and still is, an international bestseller. To be clear, she is not the author of the French Women Don’t Get Fat books. French Children Don’t…
Eggshell Skull by Bri Lee
During her year as a judge’s associate in the District Court in Queensland, Bri Lee finds herself enduring case after case after case involving rape, sexual assault and child abuse. A fact that Lee keeps hidden from friends and family…
Staying by Jessie Cole
When Jessie Cole is eleven years old, her father presents her with some baby mice he’s uncovered in their compost bin. She is determined to raise them, but one by one they die over the course of a week. Cole…
The Motherhood edited by Jamila Rizvi
In The Motherhood, Jamila Rizvi has compiled a collection of letters all written by women to earlier versions of themselves in a bid to offer guidance and reassurance for those frightful, incredibly heightened first few weeks of being a…
Miss Ex-Yugoslavia by Sofija Stefanovic
In a world increasingly characterised by large-scale migration, Miss Ex-Yugoslavia offers a fresh, youthful take on what it means to navigate two vastly different cultures and identities. In her debut memoir, Sofija Stefanovic explores the ironies of growing up in…
Girls at the Piano by Virginia Lloyd
Entering the world of some memoirs feels like an intimate conversation with a stranger who will, over the course of your time together, become your new best friend. Reading Virginia Lloyd’s exquisite memoir Girls at the Piano, tracing her…
Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia edited by Anita Heiss
This brilliant collection of short memoir from Indigenous writers highlights an enormous diversity in the life stories of Aboriginal people in Australia, from those who grew up in middle-class suburbia to those in self-determined communities, to missions and reserves, to…
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