Our latest reviews
The Eyes Are the Best Part by Monika Kim
‘I pluck one eye after the other, shoving them greedily into my mouth. I mash them into a pulp, teeth gnashing, feeling each clump slide down my throat. I eat until my stomach is full and aching …’ The Eyes…
Tehrangeles by Porochista Khakpour
Ali Milani is an Iranian-American multimillionaire. He made his fortune by inventing a microwaveable pizza in ball form. Now Ali, his wife Homa, and their four daughters live in luxury. There’s Violet, the eldest, an aspiring model with a sugar…
The Glassmaker by Tracy Chevalier
I love to travel, but nowadays vicariously, in comfort, with a book: no delayed flights, tedious planning or overcrowded sights. So I leapt at the opportunity to immerse myself in Venice and more specifically, Murano, where glassblowing was perfected over…
The Honeyeater by Jessie Tu
Jessie Tu’s debut, A Lonely Girl is a Dangerous Thing, was a runaway success during the difficult year for debut books that was 2020. It was shortlisted that year for the Readings Prize for New Australian Fiction, and right…
Jade and Emerald by Michelle See-Tho
In 2023 I was one of three booksellers who helped judge the Penguin Literary Prize, along with Penguin publisher Meredith Curnow and senior editor Kathryn Knight. This $20,000 prize has been running since 2018 and is awarded to an unpublished…
If You Go by Alice Robinson
If You Go is a powerfully evocative new novel from Alice Robinson, winner of the 2019 Readings Prize for New Australian Fiction for her novel The Glad Shout.
Esther awakens to find a breathing tube deep down her throat…
The End and Everything Before It by Finegan Kruckemeyer
The End and Everything Before It, Finegan Kruckemeyer’s debut novel, explores the intricate interplay between love, loss and the power of stories.
The novel unfolds with Emma witnessing her mother’s kayak disappearing among the Arctic icebergs, setting a haunting…
A Language of Limbs by Dylin Hardcastle
I finished reading A Language of Limbs in one sitting, barely moving between the couch and the kettle. It left an aftertaste of resilient joy and deep grief – which are some of my favourite feelings to linger in –…
Big Time by Jordan Prosser
In the dystopian, autocratic country of East Australia, the government controls all internet and media, borders have been closed, and a drug called ‘F’ proliferates – a drug that allegedly allows users to see into the future. Outside East Australia…
James by Percival Everett
James by Percival Everett is narrated by Jim, the escaped enslaved man who accompanies Huck Finn when the two flee down the Mississippi River in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. At the opening of James, Jim has overheard…
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