Issue 85 of the Quarterly Essay is a timely one. The Trauma Cleaner’s Sarah Krasnostein offers a well-researched and insightful look into Australia’s mental health care systems, and its intersection with other institutions. The essay draws upon extensive research and first-hand case studies with vulnerable individuals who fell through the system’s cracks when they should…
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The Language of Food is a book with a tasty premise. It is based on the true events involving cook book author Eliza Acton, a woman who inspires chefs to this day. With its strong female characters working hard in a male dominated world, it is one that will appeal to fans of Natasha Lester’s…
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For twelve years, Aina and Whitney have lived in exile. Imprisoned on an isolated island, their lives are measured by the clock in the kitchen that dispenses the pills that keep them alive. Hobbies keep them busy while they await their release. Whitney tinkers, sculpts, maps the island. Aina does jigsaws, gardens, writes music. But,…
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Mona Awad‘s latest novel, All’s Well, tackles one of William Shakespeare‘s lesser known works. All’s Well That Ends Well is considered a ‘problem play’, not least because it sees its heroine, Helen, performing what was known as a ‘bed trick’ to consummate her marriage to her estranged husband, Bertram. But, the protagonist of Awad’s All’s Well…
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In 1906, Frances (Fan) Johnson moves from Adelaide to Fremantle with her family so that her mother, Agnes, can take care of her estranged father. Edwin Salt has been thrown out by his wife, Annie, and everyone believes that he does not have much longer to live. Though Agnes is estranged from her mercurial and…
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Love Marriage is the fourth novel from Booker Prize shortlisted author, Monica Ali; and her first novel in a decade. It is the story of Yasmin, an English doctor whose family are of Indian Muslim heritage, and her engagement to obstetrician Joe. Race, class, religion and gender all play major parts in the unfolding of…
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Kate Murray’s debut novel We Who Hunt the Hollow is a wholesome, angsty YA dystopian urban fantasy about who we are and who we want to be. Perfectly drawing on the awkwardness and fear of the late teenage years, Murray uses the anxiety and anticipation of becoming an adult to address issues of identity, family,…
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As a psychology graduate and serial online dater the premise of Speaking in Thumbs was appealing. A psychiatrist – herself a fellow dater – dons the best friend cap to decipher text messages and uncover what is REALLY being said. It’s a great idea, but I found it difficult to relate to this, as some…
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The new novel from award-winning author Emily St. John Mandel traverses time and space to tell a multifaceted story of love, endurance, human nature and reality. Sea of Tranquility is set within the same universe as her previous novels Station Eleven and The Glass Hotel offering fans of her earlier works plenty of ‘a-ha’ moments….
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Diane Connell’s The Improbable Life of Ricky Bird is about twelve-year-old Ricky Bird, whose life is slowly but surely falling apart during the summer that she becomes a teenager. Her parents have separated and her mother is moving Ricky and her six-year-old brother Ollie from Brixton to Camden to be closer to their mum’s boyfriend,…
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Shipwrecks, court fashions and the Dutch art trade of the 17th Century take centre stage in Lauren Chater’s third historical novel, The Winter Dress. Chater was inspired by a shipwreck discovered in 2014 off the island of Texel, containing a dress perfectly preserved underwater for four hundred years. The dress was later found to have belonged…
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If you thought it was too soon for a pandemic novel, you might just be put off by the premise of Toni Jordan’s newest book, Dinner with the Schnabels…don’t be! Known for her versatility across both the contemporary and historical genres, the Melbourne-based novelist has just published her first novel with Hachette. Schnabels follows down-on-his-luck former-architect Simon…
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Lizzie Pook’s debut novel, Moonlight and the Pearler’s Daughter, takes us to the fictional pearling town of Bannin Bay in the North of Western Australia. The year is 1896, and those who own fleets of pearling luggers – those such as Eliza Brightwell’s father – rule the town. But when Eliza goes to meet her father…
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Many readers will be familiar with Melbourne authors Ali Berg and Michelle Kalus thanks to their wonderful debut novel, The Book Ninja. The clever pair have now written their third book, another contemporary rom-com with a fun twist. Fancy Meeting You Here has some of the intriguing elements from their stellar debut; however, its execution…
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Benjamin Stevenson’s third novel, Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone, has been described as “Agatha Christie meets Knives Out“; which is a tall order for the whodunit genre and its legion of dedicated followers. But, I am deeply pleased to report that it is, indeed, a very apt description. Narrated by our protagonist, Ernest Cunningham,…
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The Beetoota Advocate is as proudly Australian as a Southern Cross tattoo. They are full of national pride and lay claim to Australia’s oldest newspaper accolade. Those playful minds behind a publication that has fooled actual news outlets have released a new book called Beetoota-isms. It is a kind of companion piece to their previous…
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“I think it’s really important to show that, for us, the past, present and future, are happening simultaneously.” These are the words of editor Rafeif Ismail in the introductory conversation with fellow editor Ellen van Neervan for Unlimited Futures, a collection of speculative fiction from First Nations and Afro-Black writers. They perfectly encapsulate the unifying…
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Norwegian author Lars Mytting and his English translator Deborah Dawkin transport readers back to the modest village of Butangen in The Reindeer Hunters, the second book in Mytting’s Sister Bells Trilogy. If you haven’t read the first book in the trilogy, The Bell in the Lake, I heartily recommend you do so before starting on…
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The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories is a beautiful, intelligent and poignant collection of science fiction and fantasy short stories and essays by Chinese women and non-binary creators, edited by Yu Chen and Regina Kanyu Wang. The stories range from the fantastic to fable-like, with writing voices and styles that at times feel more…
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As civil war tears 17th century England apart, Thomas Treadwater returns home, summoned by his young sister. Esther, concerned by the growing closeness between their father and a new servant, has spun quite the tale. And Thomas, though glad of a reason to escape the battlefield, thinks little of it. But when he arrives to…
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“They are having sex when the wind starts up, whispering and sighing outside.” So opens the first story in Fiona Robertson‘s Glendower Award-winning collection, If You’re Happy. The University of Queensland Press team are no strangers to publishing powerful short fiction that challenges the conventions of the form in this country; counting among their authors…
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Inspired by real acts of resistance in France during the Second World War, Sarah Steele’s latest novel The School Teacher of Saint-Michel is sure to keep you turning pages long past lights out thanks to its twin timelines of two women on a mission, eighty years apart. Hannah Stone is a teacher on the verge…
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Astrid Scholte’s League of Liars is a YA fantasy thriller full of twists and turns; in which no one can be trusted to tell the truth and everyone’s motives are questionable. It’s a suspenseful page-turner with an interesting cast, told in alternating points of view. But despite its young protagonists, the book doesn’t shy away…
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In the past, my cookbook shelf has been guilty of the ultimate home cooking sin: being purely inspirational and decorative. I find many cookbooks have insanely long ingredient lists packed with obscure and expensive items, so I often stick to my old favourites or Google specific ideas. But BOSH! on a Budget is different. The…
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Many people have living abroad on their bucket list. Australian media personality, Kate Langbroek is one of the few people that can say that she and her family have done it. In Ciao Bella! Six Take Italy she offers a travel diary about the two years her family (husband, Peter and their four children: Lewis,…
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Kerri Maher’s latest novel, The Paris Bookseller, is bound to appeal to fans of bestselling author, Natasha Lester. Not only does it take as its setting Paris during the 1920s, but it features at its core the little known history behind the setting up of the iconic Shakespeare and Co bookshop. Readers may be interested to…
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After a vicious act of revenge, Disa and her son are on the run. Desperately seeking safe passage to the home of her brother’s wife, Aud, Disa looks back at her life, and to the litany of passions, tragedies, and betrayals that have led her here. At once brutal and elegant, The Sorrow Stone is…
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Fresh off the news that the novel is to be adapted into a film by Reese Witherspoon and Zendaya, Simon and Schuster have re-released Karin Tanabe‘s historical novel The Gilded Years in February 2022. The Gilded Years is a fictionalisation of the true story of Anita Hemmings, the first African American woman to graduate from…
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The old adage that “well behaved women rarely make history” has never been truer than here in Eliza Reilly’s Sheilas: Badass Women of Australian History. Gathering together a batch of bonafide badasses in bonnets from across Australian history, Sheilas is a witty and engaging introduction to some of the country’s most interesting – and occasionally…
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“Two women set sail for a new life in Australia, bound by a secret that will change everything.” In Julie Brooks‘ debut work of historical fiction, The Secrets of Bridgewater Bay, amateur historian Molly is gifted an historical mystery by her late grandmother, Queenie. Amongst Queenie’s possessions, Molly finds a photograph of two young women…
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