Young adult

It's Not You, It's Me by Gabrielle Williams

Reviewed by Alexa Dretzke

Who would have thought a 1970s Brother typewriter would be the inspiration for this fabulous time-slip young adult story?

Forty-year-old Holly is returning from her birthday lunch in Melbourne 2020 when she inexplicably finds herself lying dazed on an LA…

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Sugar Town Queens by Malla Nunn

Reviewed by Angela Crocombe

Set in the shanty towns of Durban, South Africa, and featuring a biracial protagonist, Malla Nunn’s second novel explores identity and belonging with a loving eye.

Fifteen-year-old Amandla has been brought up by her eccentric white mother in a shanty…

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The Monster of Her Age by Danielle Binks

Reviewed by Dani Solomon

Ellie comes from an acting dynasty: her family home – a huge old Gothic mansion in Hobart – contains at least one of every film industry award (including a couple of Oscars); Errol Flynn was considered to be the family…

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Sabriel: 25th Anniversary Edition by Garth Nix

Reviewed by Julia Jackson

As a bookseller you know you’re getting old when your childhood favourites reach major milestones. 2021 marks 25 years since the release of Garth Nix’s Sabriel, the first in his Old Kingdom series. This occasion is being celebrated with…

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Half My Luck by Samera Kamaleddine

Reviewed by Lucie Dess

Layla considers herself sort of Lebanese, sort of Australian, and is struggling to find where she belongs. When she was a baby, she was cursed by the evil eye. At least, that’s what her grandmother tells her. During an intensely…

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Henry Hamlet’s Heart by Rhiannon Wilde

Reviewed by Joe Murray

A drunken game of truth or dare. Secret wishes tossed into a campfire. The last days of Year 12. A kiss.

Rhiannon Wilde’s YA debut, Henry Hamlet’s Heart, is a gorgeous queer love story set amidst the sun-soaked streets…

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Girl, Unframed by Deb Caletti

Reviewed by Angela Crocombe

American YA author Deb Caletti writes powerful stories about young women in challenging circumstances and Girl, Unframed is no exception. Sydney Reilly must leave her friends in Seattle to live with her glamorous, movie star mother in San Francisco for…

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We Were Wolves by Jason Cockcroft

Reviewed by Angela Crocombe

This unusual illustrated novel is about the relationship between a boy and his father, as well as the mythic animal energies that surround them.

The boy’s father has come back from war tormented by nightmares and inner demons. He can…

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The Other Side of Perfect by Mariko Turk

Reviewed by Claire Atherfold

In Mariko Turk’s debut novel, The Other Side of Perfect, we follow the story of Alina Keeler, a Japanese–American ballet dancer. Alina lives and breathes ballet; dancing is part of who she is, not just what she does. Then…

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Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley

Reviewed by Xiao Xiao Kingham

Firekeeper’s Daughter follows Daunis, an unenrolled Ojibwe tribe member, who has always struggled to identify a place for herself within her community. Though she is on the cusp of adulthood, her dreams of studying medicine are put on hold when…

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