FREE SEPTEMBER 2014

BOOKS MUSIC FILM EVENTS

HEAT AND LIGHT

Ceridwen Dovey on Ellen van Neerven’s debut work of fiction page 6

THE CHILDREN ACT

Brigid Mullane on Ian McEwan’s new novel

page 9

THE READINGS NEW AUSTRALIAN WRITING AWARD

The shortlist announced

page 12

NEW IN SEPTEMBER

SONYA HELEN LORELEI WES ROBERT HARTNETT GARNER VASHTI ANDERSON PLANT $29.99 $32.99 $27.99 $39.95 $21.95 page 7 $29.99 page 14 $32.95 page 22

page 14 page 21 You’ve looked after Dad’s reading needs, now look after your own.

The Bone Clocks A mind-stretching, kaleidoscopic, globetrotting feast.

When The Night Comes An evocative and gently told story about how kindness can change lives.

The Paying Guests Vintage Sarah Waters – excruciating tension and real tenderness.

The Secret Place A breathtakingly suspenseful disentangling of the truth.

Get the whole story at hachette.com.au READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 3

News

INDIGENOUS LITERACY DAY This year, Indigenous Literacy Day is on Wednesday 3 September. The Indigenous Literacy Foundation (ILF) aims to raise literacy levels and improve the opportunities of Indigenous Australians living in remote and isolated regions. The foundation does this through a free book supply program that goes to over 200 organisations and communities, and through a community publishing project that publishes books and stories, largely written by children. The foundation needs your support to help raise funds to buy books and literacy resources for children in these communities. Readings will donate 10% of sales from our shops on this day to the Indigenous Literacy Foundation. Help us celebrate Indigenous Literacy Day this year by buying books at one of our shops or online at readings. com.au. You can donate to the foundation by donating to the Readings Foundation 2014 READINGS NEW (Text), Fatal Impact by Kathryn Fox online – all online donations to the Readings AUSTRALIAN WRITING AWARD (Pan Macmillan), In the Morning I’ll Be Foundation during September will go to SHORTLIST Gone by Adrian McKinty (Serpent’s Tail), the ILF. Please visit readings.com.au/the- readings-foundation. We’re delighted to announce our inaugural Beams Falling by PM Newton (Viking), Readings Monthly shortlist for the Readings New Australian One Boy Missing by Stephen Orr (Text) Free independent monthly newspaper and The Dying Beach by Angela Savage Writing Award. The shortlisted books are THE READINGS FOUNDATION published by Readings Books, Music & Film (Text). Find out more about the shortlists The Tribe by Michael Mohammed Ahmad GRANTS ARE NOW OPEN (Giramondo), An Elegant Young Man by for other categories at austcrimewriters. Applications for the Readings Foundation Editor Luke Carman (Giramondo), Foreign Soil by com/content/2014-ned-kelly-awards. Belle Place Grants 2015 are now open. The Readings Maxine Beneba Clarke (Hachette), Only the [email protected] Foundation was established in 2009 Animals by Ceridwen Dovey (Penguin), The CLASSICAL BOX SET SALE to support Victorian individuals and Night Guest by Fiona McFarlane (Penguin) Editorial Assistant It’s time for the fabulous classical box set organisations that wish to further the and After Darkness by Christine Piper (Allen Bronte Coates sale again, where we offer up to 70% off development of literacy, community work & Unwin). This year’s guest judge is Hannah [email protected] selected titles. Featuring major works from and the arts. Some projects previously Kent, author of Burial Rites (Pan Macmillan) JS Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Shostakovich, supported include Refugees, Survivors and Advertising and co-founder of Australian literary journal Wagner and Schubert, all performed by Ex-Detainees (RISE), Victorian Aboriginal Tate Jerrems Kill Your Darlings. The winning author will the great artists of the classical world Child Care Agency (VACCA), Save the [email protected] be announced in the November edition of such as Herbert Von Karajan, Vladimir Children, 100 Story Building, Reading (03) 9341 7739 Readings Monthly and will receive a prize Ashkenazy, Pavarotti, Fischer-Dieskau out of Poverty, the Stella Prize and the of $4000. Read more about the shortlisted and Alfred Brendel, to name a few. The Hot Desk Fellowships at the Wheeler Graphic Design titles and the prize on page 12. Centre, along with ongoing support of Cat Matteson sale is available at all Readings shops theartdept.com.au and online at readings.com.au, with free Sacred Heart Mission, Brotherhood of St 2014 NED KELLY AWARDS delivery within Australia, from now until Laurence’s HIPPY program and Glenfern Contributors SHORTLIST 30 September. But hurry, only while stock Writers’ Studios. Readings donates 10% of its overall profit to the Readings Ceridwen Dovey The Ned Kelly Awards are Australia’s lasts. See page 23 for highlights from the Foundation each year, and crucial funds Samuel Rutter oldest and most prestigious prizes range of titles available. are also raised from donations by our honouring our crime fiction and customers in return for gift wrapping, and Front Cover true crime writing. Put on by the 20% OFF VINYL through using the accommodation window The cover image is a detail from the jacket of Australian Crime Writers Association Ian McEwan’s new novel, The Children Act We are also offering 20% off our fabulous service. All donations to the Readings (austcrimewriters.com), the shortlists Photograph: © Gilles Peress/Magnum Photos range of vinyl, for a limited time only. The Foundation over $2 are tax deductible. For for each award category – including offer will be available from now until Sunday more information please visit readings. Fiction, First Fiction, True Crime and Cartoon 7 September at our St Kilda, Hawthorn and com.au/the-readings-foundation or for the Sandra Harvey short-story award Oslo Davis Carlton shops (not online). We recommend enquiries about the application process (unpublished) – were introduced by oslodavis.com this short, sweet sale as a perfect excuse to please email Tate Jerrems at tate.jerrems@ Michael Robotham at the Bendigo come and check out the newly expanded readings.com.au. Grant applications close Writers Festival in August. The Readings donates 10% of its profits each vinyl section at our Carlton shop. Friday 31 October. year to The Readings Foundation: shortlisted titles for the fiction categories readings.com.au/the-readings-foundation are Bitter Wash Road by Garry Disher

Saturday 11 Oct

Saturday 25 Oct SAVE THE DATE Mar—May 2015

Mar—Sep 2015 4 READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014

September Events MEET ANNABEL Book Launches 24 LANGBEIN, THE SIMON RICKARD RJURIK DAVIDSON FREE RANGE COOK Joy Damousi and Stuart Macintyre will 8 ON HEIRLOOM 18 ON FANTASY AND launch Carolyn Holbrook’s non-fiction book, Annabel Langbein has created over 200 Anzac: The Unauthorised Biography. VEGETABLES POLITICS recipes for her new cookbook, Through the Tuesday 2 September, 6pm Come along to hear Simon Rickard, the Rjurik Davidson’s Unwrapped Sky is a fantasy Seasons, inspired by a year of fresh harvests. Readings Carlton former head gardener at the Diggers Club, novel that draws comparisons with the work Entry is $10 per person and includes Join us for the launch of S.K. Reid’s memoir, talk on Heirloom Vegetables: A Guide to of China Miéville. Jeff Sparrow will chat with a glass of wine. Please book at A Year of Medical Thinking. Their History and Varieties. This event will Davidson about the role of politics in the book. readings.com.au/events Wednesday 3 September, 6pm be supported by Aunt Maggie’s Organics Wednesday 24 September, 6pm Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events Readings Hawthown (auntmaggies.com.au). Readings Hawthorn Thursday 18 September, 6.30pm Gerry Simpson will launch Charlotte Entry is $10 per person and includes Readings Carlton Peevers’ non-fiction book, The Politics of a glass of wine. Please book at ERIK JENSEN ON Justifying Force: The Suez Crisis, the Iraq readings.com.au/events MEET DARREN 30 ADAM CULLEN War, and International Law. Monday 8 September, 6pm Wednesday 3 September, 6.30pm Readings Hawthorn Erik Jensen’s Acute Misfortune is the 19 PALMER OF Readings Carlton THE BLOCK unflinching portrait of the artist Adam Cullen. This is a story of talent and addiction, Robyn Annear will launch Kirsty Murray’s AN INTIMATE An interior designer and a judge on The told at close quarters and without judgement. novel, The Year it All Ended. 12 PERFORMANCE Block, Darren Palmer shares insider tips on Thursday 4 September, 6pm WITH ÉMILIE creating a luxuriously comfortable home in Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events Readings Hawthorn Easy Luxury. Palmer will be in conversation Tuesday 30 September, 6.30pm SIMON with Readings’ Event Manager Chris Gordon. Readings Carlton Creator and editor of the Through My French singer, songwriter and composer of Eyes series Lyn White will launch Robert electronic music Émilie Simon will perform Entry is $10 per person and includes a glass Hillman’s new addition to the series, Malini: of wine. The ticket price is redeemable if you songs from her latest album, Mue. October Through My Eyes. purchase a copy of Easy Luxury at the event. Thursday 11 September, 6.30pm Free, no booking required. Please book at readings.com.au/events Readings Carlton Friday 12 September, 5pm Friday 19 September, 6pm SHAUN MICALLEF Arena Publications will launch Arena Readings Carlton Readings Hawthorn 2 ON AMERICAN Magazine: Issue 131. PRESIDENTS Thursday 11 September, 6.30pm GARETH EVANS A READING WITH Shaun Micallef is celebrating the release of Readings Hawthorn WITH GEORGE 16 FAVEL PARRETT 22 his new book, The President’s Desk. Each Alex Papps (as seen on ABC4Kids’ Play Award-winning author Favel Parrett will MEGALOGENIS chapter revolves around different American School) along with Em Rusicano will read from her novel, When the Night Comes, Former Cabinet Minister Gareth Evans presidents, with the desk as a central theme. celebrate the launch of PlayFest, a new provides an insider’s account of the Hawke– music festival for kids. the hauntingly beautiful story of a young girl Entry is $10 per person and the ticket price Saturday 13 September, 10.30am transformed by the power of kindness. Keating years with the release of Inside the is redeemable if you purchase a copy of The Readings Hawthorn Hawke–Keating Government. Evans will be President’s Desk at the event. Please book at Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events in conversation with George Megalogenis. readings.com.au/events Join us for the launch of Sally Milner’s Ducks Tuesday 16 September, 6.30pm Thursday 2 October, 6.30pm on the Pond: Sue Mackinnon, a Chosen Life. Readings Carlton Entry is $5 per person and includes a glass of Readings Hawthorn wine. Please book at readings.com.au/events Monday 15 September, 6.30pm Monday 22 September, 6.30pm Readings Carlton MICHAEL KATAKIS Readings Hawthorn DEREK LANDY ON Join us for the launch of Lorelei Vashti’s 16 ON A THOUSAND 5 SKULDUGGERY memoir, Dress, Memory: A Memoir of My SHARDS OF GLASS JAMES BOYCE PLEASANT Twenties in Dresses. As the manager of Ernest Hemingway’s Wednesday 17 September, 6.30pm 22 WITH MARTIN Derek Landy is the creator of the Skulduggery intellectual estate, Michael Katakis is a Readings Carlton FLANAGAN Pleasant series that features plenty of spooky treasure trove of fascinating tales. Come mystery for kids. Prizes will be given for the Join us for the launch of Tom Skinner and along to hear him discuss his book, A Join James Boyce and Martin Flanagan for best costumes, so dress to impress. Janet Wolf’s picture book, Bus Fuss. Thousand Shards of Glass. an in-depth discussion of the theory behind Saturday 20 September, 2pm Boyce’s new book, Born Bad: Original Sin and Entry is $10 per person and the Readings Hawthorn Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events the Making of the Western World. ticket price is redeemable if you Tuesday 16 September, 6.30pm purchase any one of Derek Landy’s Join us for the launch of the first English Cinema Nova, 280 Lygon Street, Carlton 3053 Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events books at the event. Please book at translation of Italian writer Nanni Monday 22 September, 6.30pm readings.com.au/events Balestrini’s novel, Vogliamo Tutto (We Readings Carlton Want Everything). UNCOMMON Sunday 5 October, 3.30pm Cinema Nova, 280 Lygon Street, Carlton 3053 Tuesday 23 September, 6.30pm PLACES AT 17 SEYMOUR Readings Carlton MELBOURNE 22 BIOGRAPHY JULIA GILLARD ON Join us for the launch of David Stavanger’s FRINGE LECTURE 7 HER STORY poetry collection, The Special. As part of the Melbourne Fringe’s Thursday 25 September, 6.30pm Drawing from his biographies of Ludwig Together with the Wheeler Centre, we’re Uncommon Places project, artist Rafaella Readings Carlton Wittgenstein, Bertrand Russell and delighted to host an evening with Julia McDonald will transform the laneway J Robert Oppenheimer, Ray Monk discusses Gillard as she celebrates the release of her alongside Readings Carlton with a mural the role and limitations of biographies in autobiography, My Story. Gillard will be in For more information and updates, please and sound piece that celebrates Readings understanding philosophers and scientists. conversation with Kate Langbroek. visit the events page at and its community. Find out more at readings.com.au/events melbournefringe.com.au/uncommon-places. Free, but please book at Please visit readings.com.au/events for [email protected] information on ticket prices and booking details. Free, no booking required. Please note bookings do not necessarily Monday 22 September, 6pm Tuesday 7 October, 7.15pm Friday 17 September to Sunday 5 October guarantee a seat and some events may be Melbourne Town Hall, 90–120 The Regent Theatre, 191 Collins Street, Readings Carlton, laneway beside shop standing room only. Swanston Street, Melbourne 3000 Melbourne 3000 THE BONE CLOCKS David Mitchell

AMBON Hachette. PB. $29.99 Roger Maynard Teenage runaway Holly Sykes encounters a strange Hachette. PB. $35 woman who offers a small kindness in exchange for ‘asylum’. Holly quickly becomes an unwitting player in a murderous feud played out in the shadows and margins of our world. Spellbinding. February 1942, the Island of Ambon fell to the might of the Japanese war machine. And here began the catalogue LIFE OR DEATH of horrors for the men who Michael Robotham

survived. Hachette. PB. $29.99 A story of heroic acts of kindness, depravity, bravery Audie Palmer spent a decade in prison for armed robbery and the disappearance of seven million and memories long buried. dollars. Everybody believes Audie knows the money’s whereabouts and after years of torture and intimidation he suddenly vanishes – the day before his release.

HELL-BENT BEFORE I GO TO SLEEP Douglas Newton S.J. Watson

Scribe. PB. $32.99 Text. PB. $19.99

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New Australian Writing

Heat and Light traverses both the mythical and the real, from the fractured familial ties of the Kresinger family to an imagined, futuristic world where the fate of a people is threatened. Here, Ellen Van Neerven talks with Ceridwen Dovey about her debut work of fiction, which takes traditional storytelling and gives it a contemporary twist. Heat and Light Ceridwen Dovey interviews Ellen van Neerven about her debut work of fiction

t’s a really interesting thing, isn’t book’s centre. It’s a brilliant parable set in it? To write a book and feel so the near future, when Australian politicians different about it all the time, and have decided to give Indigenous people not know some of the answers a ‘second country’ called ‘Australia2’ in ‘Ito the questions,’ 23-year-old debut author a horribly misguided attempt at making Ellen van Neerven Ellen van Neerven confides early in our reparations. Indigenous people can apply to conversation. She is shy but candid over the live in this country, but they must ‘show how Scenic Rim, met her Dutch father while For the moment, she is managing to phone, often surprising me by asking to hear they have been removed or disconnected she was travelling in Europe, and they balance writing and editing, though she my own thoughts in return, which makes it from their country – priority given to those later moved back to Brisbane. Van Neerven feels ‘conflicted every day about what I as much a pleasure to speak to van Neerven who don’t even know where they’ve come admits she was writing stories in her journal should be doing with any energy I have, any about her breathtakingly good work of from’. This ‘country’ is to be formed from from a young age (‘rip-offs of The Chronicles creativity I have. When I was playing sport fiction, Heat and Light, as it is to read it. the southern Moreton Bay Islands, and the of Narnia’), but her main focus during her seriously, I knew how to prepare myself for An earlier version of the book won narrator, a young Aboriginal woman, takes a school years was sport. She attended a a big match, but I’m still figuring out how van Neerven the David Unaipon Award job as Cultural Liaison Officer to negotiate school with an excellence program in soccer, to prepare to live and work well as a writer.’ – Unpublished Indigenous Writer in the with a mysterious species of ‘plantpeople’ and still plays competitive soccer twice a Most of the stories in the book’s 2013 Queensland Literary Awards. She recently discovered living on the edges of week. ‘I’m definitely tortured and haunted final section, ‘Light’, are set in the present, then worked closely with her editor at the the islands, ‘their green human-like heads by sport as much as I am by writing,’ she many told through the voice of a clear-eyed University of Queensland Press to reshape lined up on the banks’. says. ‘Part of the problem is that I’ve never young female narrator who challenges the book into its present structure, bundling Van Neerven explains she’s part had any aggression in me, never been fixed cultural and sexual identities. One of the short stories and a novella-length piece of a growing number of Indigenous authors competitive enough. And I’m realising that the recurring themes is how Indigenous into three separate but thematically linked who are finding it productive to write in writing is about competition too, not just identity has to be performed for outsiders, sections. It’s difficult to categorise the book other genres, such as how Raymond Gates actual awards, but making space for yourself while at the same time proof of belonging – a story collection? A novel-in-stories? Van writes horror tales, Tristan Savage writes to have a voice.’ It was in the confusion of is constantly negotiated within families Neerven agrees: ‘I think we should just call science fiction, or Siv Parker has created finishing high school, unsure ‘what to do and communities. A woman resents her it fiction.’ Even before she won the David ‘tweetyarns’ on Twitter. She experiments estranged cousin when he asks for help Unaipon Award, her writing was receiving with storytelling forms at every opportunity. with his Confirmation of Aboriginality recognition, with one of her stories As part of an event for the National Young ‘Van Neerven explains she’s application; she believes only those who collected in The Best of McSweeney’s, edited Writers’ Festival, she stuck Post-it notes all ‘know who they are and … [are] living as by Dave Eggers. over herself to present a ‘memory mashup’, part of a growing number who they are’ should be eligible, though she Heat and Light starts with a set mixing up random jottings and Facebook of Indigenous authors who gradually accepts that full knowledge of self of stories about members of the Kresinger status updates, and afterwards asked the is an impossible ask of any human being. family, who are re-evaluating their lives audience to do a ‘memory Mexican wave’ are finding it productive to The cousin’s perspective is presented in in the wake of new knowledge about their by sharing impromptu stories about their another story about the childhood trauma true grandmother, Pearl, and the curse she mums (many were in tears by the session’s write in other genres …’ that led him to leave behind that version inherited and visits upon the family over end, as was van Neerven herself ). She of himself, why he had ‘stopped ticking generations. Pearl is Bundjalung, the ‘kind of was surprised by the audience’s positive and who to be, never getting it quite right’, the box’. As van Neerven says, ‘There is woman that draws men like cards’, and the response, as she doesn’t feel she’s a natural that she decided to study creative writing so much difference captured within this violence she endures at the hands of men has performer: ‘I grew up in a family of amazing at Queensland University of Technology, single identity. How can all the ways of consequences far into the future. ‘So much is live storytellers, but I didn’t inherit the with encouragement from her parents and belonging, of identifying as Aboriginal, ever in what we make of things,’ the narrator says ability to tell a yarn. I’ve always been very extended family. be represented in one tickable box?’ at one point, reflecting on her father’s refusal private, and felt I could express myself Van Neerven is now also an editor to admit that Pearl is his mother. ‘The better with pen and paper. When I dreamed and mentor to other Indigenous authors Ceridwen Dovey’s debut novel, Blood Kin stories we construct about our place in our about being a writer, I didn’t realise there as part of her work at the State Library of (Penguin), was published in 15 countries and families are essential to our lives.’ would be so much performance involved.’ Queensland on black&write!, an Indigenous shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize. The The book’s middle section, ‘Water’, Van Neerven has Mununjali and writing and editing project. She edited the Wall Street Journal has named her as one of is a longer work of speculative fiction, which Dutch heritage, and grew up in the same recent digital publication Writing Black: their ‘artists to watch’. Her latest book of van Neerven says some mentors encouraged Brisbane neighbourhood where her mum New Indigenous Writing from Australia, and fiction is Only the Animals, described by the her to develop into a stand-alone novel, was raised. Her mother, who belongs to the is currently editing work by Indigenous Guardian as a ‘dazzling, imagined history of though she is now glad she placed it at the Yugambeh people of the Gold Coast and authors Jane Harrison and Adrian Stanley. humans’ relationship with animals’. READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 7

New Fiction Mark’s News and views from Readings’ Managing Director, Mark Rubbo clear that the father’s fascinating veneer is Say Australian not all it appears. Throughout the novel, Rex’s real form is just beyond our gaze, and much like something slippery in the water A few years ago our events manager, Christine Gordon, some friends of Readings and I went HEAT AND LIGHT might brush against your foot, this form to the Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF). For lots of reasons it was the best literary festival I’d Ellen van Neerven emerges fleetingly – as accusation but never been to. Sorry Melbourne, sorry Sydney, sorry Adelaide and sorry Ubud, but none of you can UQP. PB. $22.95 fact. The truth remains ambiguous and it’s match the vibrancy, diversity and sheer size of the JLF. This year, Readings has recruited In 2013, a young precisely this unknown that makes reading Marieke Brugman to lead a tour to the 2015 JLF. Marieke has been taking tours to India Queensland Golden Boys so tense and frightening. for over 25 years and knows how to do it in great comfort and style. She has planned a very writer, Ellen van Hartnett’s villains are not cartoonish; rather, special tour for Readings: on our first day in Delhi, we’ll be given a private tour of the Qutub Neerven, was awarded they are shapeshifters from fairytales. Is Rex Minar followed by lunch at the beautiful Sanskriti Kendra (Cultural Centre) at the Sanskriti the prestigious David monstrous, or misunderstood? Did your foot Foundation – established to create an appreciation of Indian traditional arts and culture – Unaipon Award. touch a piece of ocean debris or something that includes a visit to the foundation’s museum led by the senior curator and founder, OP Among short-fiction far more sinister? Jain. In the evening, Rana Dasgupta, author of the acclaimed book about Delhi, Capital, will writers in Australia, In the midst of this uncertainty, join us for dinner and fill us in on the history of the city. In Jaipur, the heritage-listed Castle news travels fast when the children in the community of Golden Kanota has been reserved for the Readings group. Members of the group will also be invited a new kid appears on Boys devise their own rules – rules to attend special events during the festival. Confirmed guests of the 2015 JLF include Booker the block. Along with many writers, I constructed from a naive logic and a warped Prize-winner Eleanor Catton, historian Bettany Hughes, Hanif Kureishi, Mark Holland, VS eagerly anticipated the release of van sense of fairness that insists if something Naipaul, and our own Christos Tsiolkas. For me, the most stimulating aspect of the festival Neerven’s first book. She had earlier bad happens then somebody must be I attended a few years ago was the strong contingent of authors from the subcontinent and tantalised readers when one of her stories, punished. When one character learns her other parts of Asia. I’ve booked my space for next year and I hope some of you will join me. ‘S & J’, was published in Issue 41 of parents likely married because her mother For more details email Marieke Brugman on [email protected]. There is also the McSweeney’s in 2012, and the story is now fell pregnant with her, she readily accepts option of extending the tour following the festival to include a Rajasthan Cultural Tour. included in the superb Heat and Light. The responsibility for their unhappy lives now. We have just finished the first round of judging for the inaugural Readings New collection is thematically presented under As with her previous works, it’s Hartnett’s Australian Writing Award and the shortlisted books are on page 12. The intention of this the motifs of ‘Heat’, ‘Water’ and ‘Light’. clear-eyed depiction of this simultaneous award and its sister award, the Readings Children’s Book Prize, is to raise the profile of While together the stories represent a brutality and sensitivity of children that on-the-rise and debut Australian authors, bringing their works to a wider pool of readers. tender slice of a greater whole, each section I found most gripping. The intimate We give $4000 in prize money to the winner of each category. The winner of the Children’s is crafted with individual care. yearnings and injustices these children feel Book Prize was Song for a Scarlet Runner by Julie Hunt and I’m particularly pleased that Many writers attempt to convey so keenly are cleverly located within larger we’ve sold over 500 copies of the book since it was shortlisted, and it’s still going strong. Our the sense of foreboding that exists ‘out issues of class, religion and family. Golden New Australian Writing Award shortlist is diverse, ranging from Luke Carman’s innovative there’, beyond the big cities and seaboards Boys is a powerful novel. An Elegant Young Man to Fiona McFarlane’s impressively well-formed The Night Guest. The of the country. Some fail. Few succeed to winner will be announced in the November issue of Readings Monthly, and I and the other the extent that exists between the pages of Bronte Coates is the Editorial Assistant for Readings judges will be aided in making our final choice by Hannah Kent, author of the Heat and Light. The maturity displayed by Readings Monthly hugely successful first novel Burial Rites. Our meetings to choose the shortlist became quite van Neerven is evident immediately in the passionate at times, so I’m looking forward to hearing Hannah’s views. book’s first story, ‘Pearl’, set in the terrain of THE FAMILY MEN Finally, some of you may remember Wayne Larsen, who worked at Readings marginal Australia, both geographically and Catherine Harris Carlton off and on from 1975 until 2005. Wayne sadly passed away last month – he was a socially. The young narrator is an observer Black Inc. PB. Was $29.99 wonderful bookseller and colleague. to the fragmented lives of the town and $26.99 the resulting experiences of prejudice. She AFL player Harry is also, somewhat mysteriously, sensually Furey should be immersed in it. on top of the world – Van Neerven’s characters both his team has won the From love the country and are acutely aware of premiership and his its potential for violence – although much place in his family’s the of this is wrought by those with little footballing dynasty respect for the land or those who live on looks assured. But Martin Shaw, Books it. This is no more evident than in the final Harry is tormented by Readings Books Division Manager section of the book, ‘Light’, an ensemble of the sordid events of Desk 10 stories providing a remarkable insight, Sportsman’s Night – an end-of-season for better and worse, into family and celebration involving alcohol, testosterone social dynamics in a landscape that is both and an unspeakable act on an underage girl. Shortly after you read this column, the shortlist for the Man Booker Prize 2014 will be nurturing and unforgiving. I am certain His memory of the night is hazy, but what announced. Due to a quirk in the prize’s eligibility criteria (namely, to allow not-yet- this is just the first of many books from this he does remember upends his published works), several of the longlistees are only just now being published. We’ve remarkable young talent. understanding of his club, his sport and his reviewed two that are released in September (with more to come in October) – Joseph place in football culture. O’Neill’s The Dog and David Mitchell’s The Bone Clocks – and, if the quality of these are Tony Birch is the author of Blood (UQP), Wracked with guilt, Harry any indication, it’s clearly going to be an unenviable task for the judging panel to prune shortlisted for this year’s Miles Franklin withdraws into himself, avoiding the longlist from 13 to six. Award. He has also published widely as a journalists, his teammates, and the bevy of Attracting some comment, of course, were a few of the absences on the list, such short-fiction writer coaches and managers who speak only in as the new Martin Amis and Ian McEwan. Not much can be read into that, though: our the glib aphorisms expected of sportsmen. reviewer calls Amis’s Zone of Interest ‘an ambitious project’ and a ‘culmination of a life’s GOLDEN BOYS All require him to remain loyal to the club reading’ on Nazi Germany and the Holocaust; while McEwan’s The Children Act is ‘a Sonya Hartnett and to the narrative they have built for him small book bursting with big ideas’, with the central character a Family Court judge who Hamish Hamilton. PB. $29.99 as the son of an AFL legend whose off- is regularly confronted with some particularly thorny ethical dilemmas. Reading Sonya field debauchery tore his family apart and Talking of prizes, the 2013 recipient of the David Unaipon Award for Hartnett’s Golden claimed a woman’s life. As the season fades, unpublished Indigenous writing was Ellen van Neerven, and her short stories seem set to Boys is unnerving, an Harry begins to question who he is after the become one of the literary debuts of the year. For our reviewer, Tony Birch, it is ‘certain experience akin to siren sounds. [Heat and Light] is just the first of many books from this remarkable young talent’. treading deep water. Catherine Harris’s novel smoulders Meanwhile, we also have second books from Catherine Harris with an AFL-themed Everything above the rather than explodes – the novel is a little novel, The Family Men, ‘a starkly brilliant and uniquely Australian novel that stays with surface appears calm, slow going at first, but builds to create a you long after reading’; and from Favel Parrett, much-loved author of Past the Shallows, but there’s the sense of quiet suburban horror as the events with When the Night Comes, a novel that shifts between Tasmania and the Antarctic via lingering sensation that of the night are gradually revealed while the cargo ship the Nella Dan. anything could be perceptions of innocence and guilt swing Non-fiction, meanwhile, likewise presents a surfeit of important books. Paul Kelly lurking below. And as I made my way back and forth and blend together. Harry brings his trilogy on Australian political history to a close with Triumph and Demise: The through this novel, my heart was in my is stubborn, tempestuous and selfish, but Broken Promise of a Labor Generation; Gareth Evans reveals his cabinet diary in Inside throat, the tension palpable. a sympathetic and compelling character the Hawke–Keating Government; Naomi Klein is back with This Changes Everything: Reminiscent of Butterfly, her nonetheless – the narrative shifting between Capitalism vs. the Climate; and Maxine McKew offers an insight into our education system brilliant 2009 novel, Golden Boys is an him and the unnamed girl as they are each and its prospects in Class Act. Catching our eye too is Sam Vincent’s Blood and Guts, a emotionally charged and subtly crafted work caught in an inexorable spiral around the fascinating account of the global whaling industry; Lorelei Vashti’s Dress, Memory, a about the particular angst of childhood and fateful moment. coming-of-age memoir; and a great new music history from Greil Marcus. adolescence. When the Jensons move into There are obvious comparisons to But the month belongs to the incomparable Helen Garner and her new non- a working-class neighbourhood, the other be drawn with Anna Krien’s Night Games fiction, This House of Grief. An account of the awful Farquharson murder trial, it is just the families are entranced by their charm and – in many ways, Harris’s fictionalised sort of bravura performance we’ve come to expect from one of the country’s great writers. wealth. Yet, from the opening scene, it’s 8 READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014

Essay Michel Houellebecq as himself Samuel Rutter on what might be Houllebecq’s best work of fiction

he appearance of writers on the For those unacquainted with the also be considered a legitimate bestseller. his groceries’, and after his kidnapping, silver screen is nothing new – author, he is widely considered the greatest The biggest blow-up occurred when a the author forms a romantic attachment think of William S Burroughs living French novelist at the same time as journalist from French magazine Lire spent to a prostitute pointedly named Fatima, in Drugstore Cowboy or Maya being one of the most reprehensible human an entire day in a bar with the author and portrayed by a young French actress of TAngelou who both wrote Janet Jackson’s beings in pubic life. Beginning his career by left his tape recorder running. The line that Maghreb heritage. This is not a PR exercise, poetic lines and played a minor character publishing poetry and a well-received study made the front-page, and apparently there however – Houellebecq insults one of the in John Singleton’s 1993 ‘hit’ Poetic Justice. on HP Lovecraft, his first novel, Whatever, could have been many, was ‘la religion la kidnappers for being a gypsy and openly At best these writers appear as a more or was published in 1994 and followed by plus con, c’est quand même l’islam’ that in mocks the others when they try to engage less romanticised version of themselves, Atomised in 1998 and Platform in 2001. True rough translation gives the idea that Islam him on a discussion of the literary merit of with a few zinging one-liners, and at worst celebrity status arrived with The Possibility is the dumbest religion of them all. While JRR Tolkien. Houellebecq-as-Houellebecq’s they have a non-speaking cameo in the film of an Island in 2005 and his literary the author met the public outcry with response when confronted by these three is adaptation of their bestselling novel. consecration was confirmed in 2010 when indifference, a phone call from the prime telling: ‘I never said I was tolerant.’ Screening at this year’s Melbourne he was awarded France’s most prestigious minister’s office eventually saw him laying Where does this performance International Film Festival, The Kidnapping literary prize, the Prix Goncourt, for his low while the storm passed. sit in Houellebecq’s body of work? It of Michel Houellebecq is an altogether novel The Map and the Territory. Other As a public figure Houellebecq seems in some ways to be a departure different proposition. Starring the author as projects have included the publishing of his is interesting precisely because of the from his writing self. His literature has himself, the film purports to account for a correspondence with philosopher Bernard- gulf between his projected air of nihilistic always been autobiographical, and his week in 2011 when Houellebecq, supposed Henri Lévy and his self-directed cinematic indifference and his carefully curated depressive obsession with death, which to be touring his novel The Map and the adaptation of The Possibility of an Island, media presence. He seems to have in The Possibility of an Island seemed to Territory in the Netherlands, dropped off which was roundly deemed ‘a stinker’ combined free-market capitalism, twenty- point inevitably towards suicide, was rather the face of the earth entirely. While the by critics at its debut at the Locarno first century celebrity and a Balzacian ingeniously dealt with in The Map and the brief disappearance of a literary novelist International Film Festival. concept of the novelist as social chronicler Territory. His latest collection of poetry, might not seem like much, in France it Of the many charges levelled in a melange that has resulted in what can Configuration du dernier rivage, is an as-yet engendered a veritable media circus, against him (and this only from what has only be described as a very strong ‘personal untranslated work that again deals with with one sensationalist tabloid linking been published in his novels) the most brand’. He’s notorious for wearing a death – with the transition towards ‘the his disappearance to al-Qaeda. Director serious are that of deep-seated misogyny disgusting green parka year-round, toting final shore’. In the film, however, the role Guillaume Nicloux presents a scenario in and racism – his work features graphic plastic shopping bags and constantly of Houellebecq as celebrity seems to trump which three hoods kidnap Houellebecq sexual encounters often springing from a smoking cigarettes, holding them weakly that of Houellebecq as author. from his Paris apartment and take him to very questionable gender dynamic in addition between his pinkie and ring finger. His It’s possible that his work might a house in the country where they proceed to a fairly rotund dismissal of the idea of a drooping, eczema-speckled face adorns the be part of a seemingly broader trend where to ply him with cigarettes and red wine, multicultural Europe. His defenders prefer covers of his books and his unconditional male writers in particular seem to refract discussing poetry, body building and to consider him not a misogynist but a love for his pet corgi is almost mythical. and complicate their depictions of self mixed martial arts while they await the misanthropist who hates men just as much This received idea of who in fiction and their public life – recent ransom money. as women (he once declared that most men Houellebecq is and what he stands for examples could include Roberto Bolaño, There’s a deadpan, cinéma-vérité are nothing more than ‘wriggling dicks’) is essentially what drives the film The JM Coetzee, Karl Ove Knausgaard or even feel to the movie reminiscent of other and point to the philosophical engagement Kidnapping of Michel Houellebecq. In Gerald Murnane. In an age of internet contemporary classics of French black in his work that is sometimes clouded by early scenes the author apathetically celebrity, Houellebecq appears to realise comedy such as JCVD and Man Bites Dog, the public scandal of his commentary. signs autographs when he is recognised that autobiography or fiction by themselves where there isn’t much of a plot but a lot of And scandal has been a part of in the street and is seen drinking wine aren’t enough – there has to be some kind banter between the actors who have been Houellebecq’s public persona for as long as and smoking cigarettes in what is clearly of public performance of the artist. It might cast to perfection. The trio of kidnappers he’s been a public figure. Rarely seen sober the early morning in his Paris apartment. just be that Houellebecq’s greatest work of are a former body builder, a martial arts in public, he’s been known to hit on female But it also seems that some of his more fiction is Michel Houellebecq himself. fighter and a mercenary who all use their journalists, fail to appear for interviews controversial traits are redressed in the film: Samuel Rutter is a writer and translator from real names in the film and seem to add or conferences and, in general, neglect to an early dialogue between Houellebecq and Melbourne. He edits the journal Higher Arc, credibility as semi-professional actors. The ‘play the game’ the media seems to require a French–African woman insinuates that and is currently working on his PhD in Buenos star, of course, is Houellebecq himself. of an author who while always literary, can the latter does much more than simply ‘buy Aires, Argentina.

take on similar themes works as an Told through the alternating between innocence and experience. ability to meet the physical and emotional effective companion piece, exploring sex, voices of husband and wife, Rachael’s Cameron sustains a sense of intrigue needs of her children, and the siblings masculinity and loyalty on a closer, more Gift explores the challenges of parenting around the question of Rachael’s real gift, rely heavily on each other. They support intimate level. Regardless of your interest a precocious teenager, and contrasts and just who is being manipulated by it, each other through cold, hunger and the in sport, The Family Men is a starkly Sydney’s dramatic coastal landscape with until the novel’s end. traumatic death of one of the brother’s first brilliant and uniquely Australian novel that the glamour and duplicity of the Paris art Sally Keighery is a freelance reviewer friends on the island. stays with you long after reading. world. In an era of risk-averse parenting, Parallel to this story is that of Bo, Alan Vaarwerk is a freelance reviewer Rachael certainly isn’t afraid of taking WHEN THE NIGHT a Danish man who visits Tasmania when any. She surfs big waves, sleeps with big COMES the ship he works on docks in Hobart. RACHAEL’S GIFT surfers, takes outrageously suggestive Somehow, Bo and Isla’s mother begin a selfies and produces art – brutally honest Favel Parrett relationship, and Bo’s gentle presence in Alexandra Cameron self-portraits – that makes adults either Hachette. PB. $27.99 the household is a highlight for the siblings. Picador. PB. $29.99 gape or blush. Favel Parrett He cooks for them, talks to them and We’ve all heard of Her parents are also motivated by burst onto the acknowledges Isla in a way that she hasn’t the pushy ‘stage a desire to uncover their own truth: Wolfe Australian literary been acknowledged before. Isla enjoys Bo’s mum’ but in her seeks answers to his daughter’s behaviour by scene in 2011 with the stories of life on the Nella Dan – the ship portrait of a family trusting his instincts while Camille revisits novel Past the that transports people and cargo between slowly imploding in the her murky past, researching the provenance Shallows, which was Australia and the Antarctic research midst of a scandal, of an artwork sourced under dubious shortlisted for the stations each year. debut novelist circumstances. In their attempts to reconcile Miles Franklin Award. Through Parrett’s skilful writing, Alexandra Cameron their ideas on how best to bring up Rachael, Parrett was widely the Nella Dan becomes a character herself. imagines the ruthless both parents must examine the legacy of praised for her richly Life on board and the camaraderie between ‘art mum’. Forty- their upbringings and temperaments. detailed writing and ability to create the workers and sailors is beautifully something couple, Camille and Wolfe, are Rachael’s Gift taps into some of empathic characters. I’m happy to say imagined – the story of the journeys, struggling to rein in their 14-year-old the deepest fears and preoccupations of that Parrett lives up to her reputation the besetment in ice for seven weeks on daughter, Rachael. When Rachael – a modern parenting: bullying, social media, with her second novel. one trip, and the ship’s eventual fate is talented artist, seductress and liar – accuses sexual predators, promiscuity, drugs, fame, When the Night Comes is narrated historically accurate. a teacher at her prestigious Sydney private ambition and giftedness. While Cameron’s by Isla, an isolated girl who, with her My only criticism is that the school of sexual misconduct, Camille fears portrayal of Rachael’s parents often slips younger brother and mother, relocates to novel lacks narrative drive, therefore isn’t her daughter’s chances of getting into the into caricature, Rachael remains sassy and Tasmania in the mid-1980s. It’s quickly for readers who need a strong plot. When best art school in France may be ruined. scarily believable, balancing perilously established that Isla’s mother lacks the the Night Comes has a dreamlike quality READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 9 to it, and its strength is in showing how It is difficult to classify The Bone the smaller, subtle events in life can be as Clocks by genre; Mitchell enjoys blending profound as the big ones. them as much as he does narrative arcs. Annie Condon is from Readings Hawthorn I think it would be safe to say that The Lorelei Vashti started collecting dresses in her twenties. Bone Clocks has something for everyone. THE SNOW KIMONO And, if you’re already a Mitchell fan, Every dress came to have a memory stitched into it and she there is the added bonus of discovering Mark Henshaw became as attached to each one as if they were the events characters already encountered in his Text. PB. $29.99 and people themselves. previous works: yet another dimension to Fifteen years after the an already captivating novel. release of his award- But what happens when Lorelei’s wardrobe gets full? winning bestseller Out Samuel Zifchak is from Readings Carlton Should she let gogo of the dresses she’sshe s outgrown,outgrown, of the Line of Fire, Mark oror trytry to hold onto them forever?forever? Henshaw returns with THE CHILDREN ACT an intricate Ian McEwan psychological thriller Jonathan Cape. HB. Was $29.99 that is also an $26.99 unforgettable I am always meditation on love and excited to read a loss, on memory and its deceptions, and the new Ian McEwan novel. ties that bind us to others. Set in Paris and His topics are so varied Japan, The Snow Kimono tells the stories of that you never quite recently retired Inspector of Police Auguste know what to expect, Jovert, former Professor of Law Tadashi but his style is always Omura and the writer Katsuo Ikeda. assured and his writing is meticulously well THE CATHERINE WHEEL crafted. His new novel, Elizabeth Harrower The Children Act, has more in common with Text. PB. $12.95 On Chesil Beach than with his smash hit First published in 1960, Atonement. It’s a small book that is busting The Catherine Wheel is with big ideas. The protagonist, Fiona Maye, Elizabeth Harrower’s is a well-respected Family Court judge who only novel not set in spends her days presiding over custody Australia, and in it she disputes and casting judgements that turns her gaze on the influence the moral welfare of children. Still grim realities of 1950s haunted by a difficult ruling that resulted in the death of a child, Fiona must now rule on London, where A poignant, humorous and heartwarming 25-year-old Clemency another high-profile case. James has moved from Adam Henry – almost 18 and a coming-of-age memoir about trying things on Sydney to a chilly bedsit on the other side of devout Jehovah’s Witness – is refusing the until you find the perfect fit. the world. When she meets the charismatic, blood transfusion that will help cure his wild Christian, she can see he’s trouble but leukaemia. Fiona must decide if she will is drawn to him nonetheless. override the boy’s and his parents’ wishes in order to give Adam the best chance of survival. Fiona’s decision to visit Adam in International hospital, and the connection that forms because of the visit, has dire consequences BEST AUSTRALIAN from Text, the Small Publisher for both characters. RELEASES OF 2014 of the Year, 2012, 2013, 2014 THE BONE CLOCKS However, what I found more David Mitchell interesting about this book were the wider Hodder Headline. PB. $29.99 moral dilemmas that surround Fiona and In his award- affect us all. In the opening scenes we winning 2004 encounter a fascinating array of ethical novel, Cloud Atlas, conundrums: a husband proposes an open British author David marriage to satisfy his sexual needs; the Mitchell interwove six parents of conjoined twins refuse the disparate stories to surgery to separate them, even though form a narrative together they will die; a devoutly religious tapestry, taking the man fights with his estranged wife over the reader on a journey fate of their daughters. McEwan’s spare from 1850 to a post- prose is well suited to these logic puzzles, apocalyptic future. Mitchell clearly realised and the novel tackles weighty issues with from the positive reception that he was on a feeling of clinical distance. I never really to a good thing, for his new novel, The Bone connected with the characters; McEwen Clocks, interweaves six disparate stories to has designed them to serve a higher Book club notes available at textpublishing.com.au form a narrative tapestry that takes the purpose than to garner sympathy. reader on a journey from 1984 to, well, a Brigid Mullane is a freelance reviewer post-apocalyptic future. Despite this repeated formula, Mitchell has created in THE PAYING GUESTS The Bone Clocks a tale that sizzles with life Sarah Waters 1-week and, in this reviewer’s opinion, possibly Little, Brown. PB. Was $32.99 outstrips its predecessor. $29.99 french Unlike Cloud Atlas, The Bone Clocks has a clear protagonist: the Set in London in courses rebellious, clairvoyant Holly Sykes, whose 1922 – a city still reeling after World War life is thrown into tumult from a young age Mon Fri I and in the midst of a by the disembodied voices of the ‘Radio 29 to 03 People’ and the enigmatic Ms Constantin. rapidly transforming sep oct From this absorbing beginning, Mitchell social order – Sarah introduces a number of intricate characters Waters’s sixth novel – from the conniving Hugo Lamb to the addresses the vainglorious Crispin Hershey – all of crumbling prestige of whom affect the direction Holly’s life the genteel class and the transitioning positions and frustrations takes. Mitchell’s mastery of narrative voice AllianceFrançaise of women. With father and sons dead, de Melbourne really shines here; each of his characters is We teach French unique in tone, thought and action, and no servants gone and the family finances in ruin, Frances Wray and her Victorian- character fails to draw the reader into their French Language & Cultural Centre since 1890 ☎ 9525 3463 or online at www.afmelbourne.com.au Not-for-profit Australian association own private world of intrigue. minded mother are forced to rent out part of 10 READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 their family villa to lodgers – working-class them! Around halfway through, I had lost improbable skyscrapers, luxury cars and international threat. However quirky newlyweds, Mr and Mrs Barber – in order to interest in Eileen’s life and was wondering beautiful women springs forth in the desert. Keyi’s execution, for an author to tackle make ends meet. It is impossible to say much whether I should bother to continue Against this chimerical backdrop, an such a taboo subject in this context is more without giving it all away, but their reading. Fortunately, I didn’t give up, and ordinary man assesses his moral culpability extraordinarily brave. arrival results in major upheaval, as tensions the story, while not really picking up any over a lifetime, more often than not casting Chris Dite is from Readings Carlton between various members of the household pace, did become more engrossing. himself out into the metaphorical doghouse. escalate with drastic consequences. Sharon Peterson is from Readings Carlton X is perpetually guilty and STATION ELEVEN The Paying Guests deals with some unworthy of the human society he observes Emily St. John Mandel of Waters’s favourite themes, including from his Pasha Royale X400(tm) massage THE ZONE OF INTEREST Picador. PB. $29.99 gender, sexuality and class, while offering chair. His main offence is that of simply Martin Amis a new historical setting. This book might existing, a self-applied judgement that There’s an Jonathan Cape. PB. Was $32.99 not be as fun as some of her earlier works develops over a narrative filled with outbreak of the (Waters seems to have had enough of her $27.99 twisted self-deprecation. The Dog also flu. The virus is famous ‘Victorian lesbo romps’ that we all The prophecy in plays on the perennial elegy to the kindness airborne, highly enjoyed so much) but The Paying Guests is Macbeth is and decency seemingly lost in these times. contagious, and kills another expertly researched historical novel fulfilled when, after so How to be good when all is bad faith? The almost everyone who that vividly recreates its chosen era. Waters much murderous blood novel showcases O’Neill’s gift for narrative contracts it. Within a portrays a world in flux as it struggles to cope has been spilt, he sees voice in these ethical refrains – it’s a week, the world as we with the consequences of the war, a theme no sense in stopping, voice that echoes the empathic range of know it is gone. This is that is reflected in the lives of the Wrays and which according to Nabokov and Forster. X is quick, funny, yet the premise underlying the Barbers. The complexities surrounding Martin Amis is the blundering and defeated, an absurd man Station Eleven, the fourth novel from Emily the displacement of returned soldiers are precise nature of the living in an absurd time: ‘The only chink St. John Mandel. Mandel takes a well-worn also addressed with particular skill. Holocaust. Opening of light is that my despair about human dystopian trope and re-imagines it in a Do not be discouraged if the novel with a witch’s cauldron and climaxing on stupidity – a commonplace – is almost decidedly literary fashion. Station Eleven seems to be losing momentum around Walpurgis Night, 1943, The Zone of Interest certainly itself stupid; and thankfully there dances back and forth in time, skipping from the halfway mark, as things do get a very is an ambitious project that takes us back to are few signs that meta-fools like me have the period before the flu outbreak to the thorough shake-up before long. Waters’s the concentration camps of Auschwitz. the power to direct the affairs of mankind.’ days, months and years after. The novel intricately weaved and suspense-filled Angelus Thomsen is an officer Parenthetically bearing witness, X attempts never settles too long on a single person, plot ultimately makes for an engaging and at Buna-Werke and the nephew of Martin to write the self in an era of autocomplete instead drawing loose connections between satisfying read. Bormann – Hitler’s private secretary. This and empty signifiers. For all its scenes a wide range of characters, exploring themes connection affords him some safety from from loneliness to the meaning of celebrity. Ruth Pirrett is from Readings Hawthorn of modern disgrace, The Dog relishes in other top-ranking Nazis suspicious of his resilience and wit, offering an intricate A large section of the novel is set 20 years after the outbreak. It follows a WE ARE NOT seductive and philandering ways. Hannah affirmation of human feeling. Doll is married to the kommandant, group of actors and musicians called the Lucy Van is a freelance reviewer OURSELVES Paul Doll, an egotistical Nazi overseeing Travelling Symphony who move between Matthew Thomas small settlements, performing Shakespeare. the selection of prisoners arriving on the DEATH FUGUE HarperCollins. PB. Was $29.99 trains, and Thomsen is quickly infatuated, Their motto is ‘survival is insufficient’, $24.99 embarking on a dangerous pursuit for her Sheng Keyi and they aim to bring a sense of joy back Giramondo. PB. $29.95 We Are Not affections. Increasingly critical of the war into the broken world. Their existence is Ourselves, and Nazi ideals, Hannah does everything This allegorical relatively happy, peaceful and safe – until Michael Thomas’s in her power to hasten the psychological tale follows a suddenly, one day, it isn’t. debut novel, caused collapse of her husband, while skirting womanising doctor The chapters featuring the quite a stir at the around Thomsen’s advances. Meanwhile, living with the Travelling Symphony are utterly gripping. London Book Fair last the horror and despair of the camps rages repercussions of his The novel’s only weakness is that it year, sparking a bidding on around them, leaving the crux of the involvement in a mass abruptly moves from these tension-filled war between UK and book to rest with Szmul, a Jewish prisoner anti-government sections to the smaller, quieter stories set in US publishers for the enslaved to carry the dead. movement. In a world the world before the outbreak. The pre-flu rights. There was One great line in Peter that feels parallel with narratives are vastly overshadowed by the much competition among Readings staff, Matthiessen’s In Paradise, published earlier China, Yuan Mengliu is a poet who followed exciting conflicts Mandel sets in motion too, with several of us putting our hands up this year, asks whether another book on the charismatic protest leader Qizi into the post-outbreak, where people are struggling for the opportunity to write this review. the Holocaust can reveal something that streets to fight a dictatorial regime. Unable to survive in a lawless world without We Are Not Ourselves follows thousands of others haven’t, and Amis is to save Qizi from a dark fate, he abandons electricity or modern resources. the life of Eileen Tumulty, born to Irish well aware of this. The words ‘Hitler’ or poetry for medicine. Once a year he allows Station Eleven has echoes of The parents and brought up in the New York ‘Auschwitz’ don’t appear once, and the text himself to search for her. His travels lead Passage and The Walking Dead (minus the City borough of Queens. From an early age, is rife with German phrases, leaving the him to Swan Valley, a ‘perfect society’ and vampires and zombies). But Mandel always Eileen is determined to better herself and casual reader occasionally bereft of context. totalitarian nightmare where torture, forced draws the novel back towards her particular rise above her humble beginnings. She meets But this is a novel and you can feel your labour and execution reign supreme over concerns of survival, family, community, and marries Ed Leary, a young scientist, way through, guided by the narrative tug human expression. the enduring nature of literature, and believing he is the key to her escape. What of love in a hellish place. A culmination of Death Fugue is a mix of satirical what it means when our very global, Eileen slowly and painstakingly begins to a life’s reading, The Zone of Interest is an adventuring, dreamy youthful romance, silly connected world shrinks backwards: ‘No realise is that Ed does not share her desire impressive display of research, if somewhat metaphor and brutal Orwellian terror. It’s all more Internet. No more social media, no to become upwardly mobile. While Eileen light on emotional punch. entertainingly jarring thanks to the author’s more scrolling through litanies of dreams wry sense of humour. This type of parody and nervous hopes and photographs of forges ahead in her career, Ed plods along, Luke May is a freelance reviewer refusing to take up any offers of promotion. – a mix of high- and low-brow – has been lunches, cries for help and expressions When the couple eventually have a child, THE DOG much more common in post-communist of contentment and relationship-status Eileen transfers some of her ambitions to literature in Russia and Asia than in the updates ...’ Smart, haunting and inventive, Joseph O’Neill Western world. Regardless of how unusual Station Eleven is highly recommended. her son. She dreams of moving her family HarperCollins. PB. $27.99 to a leafier suburb and does, in the end, get local audiences will find the style, the most Nina Kenwood is the Digital Marketing Joseph O’Neill her way. Though, just as things seem to be compelling aspect of this unsettling tale is its Manager for Readings shot to fame with looking up, Ed is diagnosed with early- unspoken but clear subject. his third novel, onset Alzheimer’s. There’s no denying Sheng Keyi’s TRILOBITES AND OTHER Netherland, the I love a good Irish–American scatological absurdism makes for a messy bestseller pegged by STORIES saga, and I was looking forward to reading allegory – this is an outrageous world where critics to take the 2008 Breece D’J Pancake something of the calibre of a Colm Tóibín, the struggle for freedom frequently crosses Man Booker Prize only Vintage. PB. $12.99 Sebastian Barry or Colum McCann novel. paths with unglamorous bodily functions. But to fail to make the It’s inevitable I’m afraid my enthusiasm diminished, this reflects a very dirty and uncomfortable shortlist (the book was that when somewhat, when I was handed an advance secret that haunts contemporary China. awarded the 2009 reading Trilobites, the copy of 620 pages! As it turns out, the Much as some might want to, the author’s PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction). The Dog collected short stories length of the novel is its major flaw. I generation cannot escape a legacy of sees O’Neill return to Booker consideration of Breece D’J Pancake, struggled to feel any of the sympathy suppression and brutality, and this is a wild, in the recently announced 2014 longlist. that we come to for Thomas’s characters that the likes of bold attempt to navigate that legacy. Just as the accolades associated with consider the backstory Tóibín are able to evoke. Thomas seems to While the Chinese government prize-winning are often discussed and of the author. This slim dwell forever on the differences between did not disclose overall spending on contested, an idea of global prestige stands volume was pulled Eileen’s and Ed’s ambitions, repeating domestic security this year, for the past out as a central theme of The Dog. Narrator together after Pancake similar scenes of Eileen’s frustration with three years it has spent more on internal X, an attorney, leaves New York for Dubai to took his own life, at the age of 26, in 1979. her husband over and over again, leaving security than on its military budget. This take on the vague role of ‘family officer’ for He was alive to see six of his stories this reader frustrated with the pair of is a sign it fears its own people’s thirst the super-rich Batros clan. A world of for freedom and equality more than any published in magazines, and these were READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 11 What I

Loved Sean O’Beirne, Events Co-ordinator for Readings

MONKEY GRIP Helen Garner Penguin. HB. $25 Also available as a Popular Penguin. PB. $9.95 I read Monkey Grip when I was first trying to learn to be a writer, and looking around to see if there was anything Australian that could help me. There must be tens of thousands of Australians who have gone through this: you’re young, you read Crime and Punishment and Madame Bovary, or other books as strong, and you think: alright, that’s very, very strong. But who’s strong, who can help me, here? And the book I found that did help – not the only one, but the one that seemed to bring special news about what was possible in Australia – was Monkey Grip. Many learned persons will disagree with me, but I think Monkey Grip, first published in 1977, was the first time a lot of hot, fresh, plain Australian language and behaviour really coexisted with literature. Plenty of books had been written by Australians and were supposed to be about Australia, but in their style, their form, they were always more than half English. Patrick White got a lot of hot, fresh Australia into his books, but he thought he had to out-English the English and hold it all in a thick, heavy modernist casing – a modernist baroque. Monkey Grip got the amounts of us and them in better proportion. It’s a plainer, scrappier sort of book, but that’s exactly right, because Australia was, and is, a plainer, scrappier sort of place. In Monkey Grip, women have a dance, go to the dunny, check each other to see if there’s period blood on their dress, and then go home to maybe ‘fuck their arses off’. But the book also gives us a sky ‘covered with a fine net of almost invisible cloud’, or children asleep, ‘cast across the bed in attitudes of struggle and

‘Many learned persons will disagree with me, but I think Monkey Grip, published in 1977, was the first time a lot of hot, fresh, plain Australian language and behaviour really coexisted with literature.’ flight’. There’s a scene, early on, where the main character, Nora, and some kids are on the beach, rolling sandballs, getting a bit burnt, while her friend Lou is reading from the Oxford Book of English Verse. And if you had to take one image of what Monkey Grip does, that’s not a bad one: it puts us in the plain, hot, clean here, but with the poetry, the literature the English gave us – equal at last. But the book does even more than this. It’s strongly, strangely honest about Australia, but it’s also strongly, strangely honest about love. In Monkey Grip, Nora loves Javo, and you can always see why – and why she shouldn’t. He’s like Lord Byron and Peter Pan: a mad, bad and dangerous Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up. Javo is tall, lean, black haired, awkward and a junkie. Crashing in and out of rooms, grinning, or stealing, he’s all that is disobedient, wild; but he’s also very often just confused, poor and sick. Monkey Grip keeps so much of what it feels like to love someone even if, as one of Nora’s friends tells her, there’s ‘no future in it’. And to do this partly because you can’t bear to think that love won’t help them, heal them. Your love! Monkey Grip makes you stay and see all the bitter and sweet consequences that come from that kind of faith. It shows us the things we do that make us like an ivy, always looking for someone to The good news about global warming is that we The Jenson family has just moved into the lock ourselves onto. Or – of course – like an arm always trying to find someone else’s can use this crisis to transform our failed economic neighbourhood. Their father, Rex, showers arm for a monkey grip. This honest book about Australia can also take you far inside, system and build something radically better. his two sons with gifts – toys, bikes, all that And in fact, all around the world, the fightback is glitters most. This makes the boys the envy of closer to the blind, needing self. Low, high, bright, dark: Monkey Grip is both an already succeeding in ways both surprising and the neighbourhood, and Rex seem like a hero. extraordinarily fine novel and a fucken good book. inspiring. The most provocative book yet from But to the eldest boy, Colt, Rex is unbearable. Naomi Klein, author of the global bestsellers Has Colt seen something in his father that will The Shock Doctrine and No Logo. destroy the Jensons’ fragile new lives? grouped with another six and released for had talent, and there’s no way of ignoring the first time, posthumously, in 1983. the potential of his work, had he continued Now Vintage has released the into maturity, and had a chance to leave his book again, along with an introduction by faults behind. James Alan McPherson, which forms an Chris Somerville is from Readings Carlton intriguing portrait of Pancake’s life and semi-mysterious death. Trilobites, for the VOGLIAMO TUTTO (WE most part, concerns blue-collar characters WANT EVERYTHING) in rural West Virginia, where Pancake Nanni Balestrini grew up. There is a certain familiarity Telephone Publishing. PB. $23.95 in the plots, and we get the whole host of young farmers, mechanics, miners, The student and drunks. It’s a collection that’s both very worker unsentimental, confident and at times movements of the late sixties in France and Set a year before the action of his Booker- In this lively, passionate and at times political oddly ambitious. shortlisted Umbrella, Will Self’s new novel introduction to the world of heirloom vegetables, Not all of the stories in Trilobites Italy are often not well continues its exploration of the complex gardener Simon Rickard describes the history of understood these days. relationship between human psychopathology many of his favourite varieties, encourages you to work, but there are moments of true and and human technological progress; and like get growing yourself, and explains why he believes inspired greatness. On occasion, following More often than not, Umbrella, weaves together multiple narratives edible gardening is so important to our future - they are depicted in across several decades of the 20th century to and the future of the planet. the career of a writer allows them to teach produce a fiendish tapestry depicting the state us how to read their work; sadly, Pancake contemporary film and we’re enmeshed in. left us with only a small pool of stories to literature as the pore over. There’s no denying that Pancake backdrop to a romance or coming-of-age story. This is the first English translation 12 READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 of the 1971 Italian novel Vogliamo Tutto ACADEMY STREET Readings New Australian Writing (We Want Everything) and is a welcome, Mary Costello forceful attack on such misleading Text. PB. $27.99 Award Shortlist 2014 interpretations. Following her highly The author, Nanni Balestrini, accomplished short- was a participant in movements that came THE TRIBE AFTER DARKNESS story collection, The close to changing the world forever. At Michael Mohammed Ahmad Christine Piper China Factory, Mary the time, Balestrini interviewed workers Giramondo. PB. $19.95 A&U. PB. $27.99 Costello’s debut novel involved in the Fiat factory wildcat strikes The Tribe is a collection While working at a is the story of one and occupations in Turin, and later turned of three novellas Japanese hospital in the woman’s life across six his notes into this spectacular call to portraying life in a pearling port of Broome decades. Tess’s arms. He universalises the experiences of Muslim-Allawite in 1942, Tomakazu childhood in 1940s brash Sicilian casual workers: as readers, Lebanese-Australian Ibaraki is arrested as an rural Ireland is defined we live and work alongside the nameless family, as seen by one of enemy alien and sent to by the sudden death of her mother. Later, protagonist, cheering on his first fight its youngest members. Loveday Internment and now in New York City, she encounters with a factory foreman and experiencing Together they offer an Camp in a remote the ferocious power of love. Academy Street together a dawning epiphany that the intimate insight into a community corner of South resonates with the rhythms of memory and world could belong to ordinary people if negotiating the conflict between tradition Australia. As tensions at of home as well as those of America’s we were willing to fight for it. The reader and modernity, and the complex tribal the isolated camp escalate, the doctor’s greatest city. is swept along as more and more people affiliations of the extended family. long-held beliefs are thrown into question demand the ‘everything’ of the title. In this and he is forced to confront his dark past. new world, there is nothing for the bosses. Poetry AN ELEGANT YOUNG The small publishers, Telephone MAN Publishing based in Melbourne, have Luke Carman About the Prize outdone themselves in the production of THE SPECIAL Giramondo. PB. $19.95 this work. The very design of the book The Readings New Australian Writing David Stavanger Our self-conscious demands that the reader think big: the dust Award (NAW), established in 2014, UQP. PB. $24.95 hero is anything but an jacket folds out to be a blueprint of the Fiat supports published Australian authors David Stavanger’s elegant young man as factory, ours for the taking! working in fiction, and recognises exciting The Special, he navigates his way A preface by the author and exceptional new contributions to local winner of the 2013 through the often included with this volume warns against literature. The award aims to increase the Thomas Shapcott perilous social world of understanding these events as historical commercial success of first or second books Poetry Prize, has been Western Sydney, a world curiosities. With the ongoing crisis in by Australian authors. The winner of the described by the of Fobs, Lebbos, Greeks, Europe and the widening gap between rich award will be announced in November and English poet Jacob Serbs, Grubby Boys and scumbag Aussies. He and poor, he cautions, the fight that kicked will receive $4000 in prize money. Polley as a ‘collection loves Whitman and Kerouac, Leonard Cohen off in Italy’s hot autumn is by no means of curious wisdoms’, and Henry Rollins, and is awkward with girls. concluded. As Paul Mason, author of Why and by Australian Meet the Judges It’s Kicking Off Everywhere, pointed out writer Anna Krien as the ‘dark mad place FOREIGN SOIL recently: young people today will grow up at 4am’ where ‘Stavanger will be there to Maxine Beneba Clarke Mark Rubbo is the to be barristers or baristas but not much keep you company’. Hachette. PB. $24.99 managing director of in between. In that context, Balestrini’s In the surreal landscape of Readings. He is explosive novel–manifesto is now more Stavanger’s first full collection, the The stories in Foreign a past president of the relevant than ever. Queensland writer proves himself a Soil give a voice to the disenfranchised: a Australian Booksellers Chris Dite is from Readings Carlton master of ambiguity and suggestion in a Association and the founding chair of the world obsessed with exactness, inquisition desperate asylum Melbourne Writers Festival. In 2006 he was HOW TO BE BOTH and immediacy. seeker paces the hallways of Sydney’s awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia. Ali Smith To open, Stavanger gives us five notorious Villawood Hamish Hamilton. PB. $29.99 definitions of ‘special’. These include Martin Shaw is the books ‘sweetheart’, ‘other than the usual’, and ‘to detention centre; a How to be Both is a division manager at observe a suicidal or psychotic mental health seven-year-old novel all about art’s Readings. He has in-patient overnight with limited support Sudanese boy finds versatility. Borrowing previously been a judge for or sleep’. It’s our assumption that this solace in a patchwork bike; an enraged from painting’s fresco the Commonwealth definition is true to Stavanger that makes black militant goes on the warpath through technique to make an Writers’ Prize. In 2013 the Australian our poetic journey all the more remarkable. the rebel squats of 1960s Brixton. original literary Booksellers Association named him Many of the poems in the double-take, Ali Bookseller of the Year. collection occupy this fictional space of ONLY THE ANIMALS Smith’s Man Booker- midnight madness: ‘they wake, active / Ceridwen Dovey Belle Place is the editor of longlisted How to Be wanting to talk … you – the Special – / Hamish Hamilton. PB. $29.99 Readings Monthly. She has Both is a fast-moving, move closer to the window / without previously been a judge genre-bending conversation between Ten animal souls tell moving at all’. Elsewhere, the descriptions for the Victorian Premiers forms, times, truths and fictions – two tales their stories, each of a psychiatric hospital are dribbled in Literary Award. She is also of love and injustice twisted into a singular caught up in human sparsely punctuated prose-poetry: ‘… lights the editor of The Blackmail Offline. yarn where time gets timeless, structural conflicts of the last out and try to remember where you came gets playful, knowing gets mysterious and century: a Russian Bronte Coates is the digital from, visiting hours are between five and fictional gets real. The two stories in the tortoise once owned by content coordinator at ten. park out front, near the row of palms book can be read in either order. the Tolstoys drifts in Readings and editorial designed to stop the mobile tower across space during the Cold assistant for the Readings J the road from stealing thoughts …’ War; in Nazi Germany, Monthly. She is the With intertwining themes of Himmler’s dog seeks Howard Jacobson co-founder and managing editor of the mental health, family and human frailty, enlightenment; a dolphin sent to Iraq by Jonathan Cape. PB. $32.99 Brisbane-born literary collective Stilts. Stavanger leads you someplace that looks the US Navy writes a letter to Sylvia Plath. Set in a futuristic world certain, then tells you you’re standing Hannah Kent’s debut novel, where the past is a on the ceiling: he couples tender with THE NIGHT GUEST Burial Rites, has earned dangerous country, not ominous, tragic with side-splitting, familial Fiona McFarlane worldwide acclaim. She is to be spoken of or with foreign. In survey, we’re presented Penguin. PB. $19.99 also the co-founder and visited, J is a love story with a glass of water and an absurdist publishing director of One morning Ruth of incomparable mental health questionnaire: ‘8. Every literary journal, Kill Your Darlings. wakes thinking a tiger strangeness – one to be Monday I look forward to / a) others going has been in her seaside talked about in the to work / b) going to work with others / c) house. Later that day a same breath as Nineteen watching spiders eat birds.’ NAW Reading Challenge formidable woman Eighty-Four and Brave Explorations of madness in poetry called Frida arrives, New World. Two people fall in love. Not yet are hardly new territory, but Stavanger’s Sign up to our NAW Reading Challenge looking as if she’s knowing where they have come from or frantic dashing between lower-case and to read all six shortlisted books (or select blown in from the sea. where they are going, they aren’t sure if they upper-case, list-form and free-form, funny any three if you don’t have the time) and In fact she’s come to have fallen in love of their own accord, or and fearless, surreal and realist, is superbly share your views with us for your chance to care for Ruth. Frida whether they’ve been pushed into each navigated and free from pretension. receive a Readings gift voucher. For more and the tiger: both are here to stay, and other’s arms. Hanging over the lives of all information visit readings.com.au/the- Maxine Beneba Clarke’s most recent work is neither is what they seem. Which of them the characters in this novel is a a past event readings-new-australian-writing-award. shrouded in suspicion, denial and apology. Foreign Soil (Hachette) can Ruth trust? READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 13

New Young Adult Fiction When she invites Apple to come and live with her, Apple doesn’t give leaving her Meet See books for kids, junior and middle readers on pages 18–19 grandmother much thought. But the unfortunately, Apple’s mum hasn’t changed and instead of providing Apple with a safe Bookseller Young Adult Book of the Month environment she creates a world of havoc. When Apple meets Rain, a young girl more THE YEAR IT ALL ENDED lost and confused than she is, the two Kirsty Murray slowly build a relationship around chaos, Alexandra Mathew, Readings Carlton A&U. PB. $16.99 sadness and beautiful poetry, and Apple 1918 should have been the ‘year it all ended’ for 17-year- realises that sometimes you just have to old Tiney Flynn and her family, as the Great War finally admit you were wrong. This is a touching novel about a dysfunctional family, nutty comes to an end and family and friends eagerly await the Why do you work in books and music? return of loved ones. But Tiney’s battles have just begun as her vegan neighbours, bitchy classmates and My primary area of interest and knowledge beloved family fractures. the magic of poetry. Perfect for mature is in classical music, but I also happen to Struggling to make sense of her brother’s death, she embarks middle-fiction readers (ages 11 and up, but love reading, so the two go together nicely. on a courageous journey from the safety of Adelaide to the parents should read first due to content) It’s a privilege to share my love of books devastation of war-torn Europe as she seeks her brother’s looking to head into young-adult territory. and music with like-minded people. grave and uncovers a family mystery. In searching for the pieces of the puzzle, Tiney Katherine Dretzke is from Readings attempts to gather her shattered family back together, and although her courage What book or music would you happily Hawthorn spend a weekend indoors with? ensures it will flourish, she knows that things can never be the same. Donna Tartt’s The Secret History is the MESSENGER OF FEAR perfect rainy-day read. It’s completely ‘1918 should have been the “year it all ended” for 17-year-old Tiney Flynn.’ Michael Grant engrossing and such a page-turner, Egmont. PB. $22.95 much like The Goldfinch, which I’ve Tiney’s story is of one young woman’s battle to rebuild a family broken by Mara awakes just started. As for music, I love staying war; it’s the story of those who were left behind to make sense of a senseless tragedy. surrounded by a in with Jordi Savall’s recordings of the Award-winning author Kirsty Murray has taken on the heroic task of bringing history strange mist with no viol music of Marin Marais. Savall is the to life by successfully condensing into one book what was surely material for three! memory of what has undisputed master of viola da gamba, and Highly recommended for ages 14 and up. happened or who she his intimate interpretations of Marais are Athina Clarke is from Readings Malvern is, other than that her heartbreakingly beautiful. name is Mara. Guided Your job entails recommending good by the mist to a church, reads and music: how do you balance AS RED AS BLOOD Reasons Why by Jay Asher or If I Stay by she finds a young man, personal taste with customer nous? Salla Simukka Gayle Forman then you will love this. a Messenger, who goes back in time to I get a great sense of satisfaction when Angela Crocombe Hot Key. PB. $16.95 punish people for deeds done wrong. He someone comes to Readings looking for offers them a game – if they choose to play a certain piece of music, and I’m able Lumikki THE JEWEL and win they go free, if they lose or decide to find an appropriate CD, or introduce Andersson is not not to play they are subjected to their the customer to a musician or composer your typical teenager. Amy Ewing greatest fear. But why is Mara here, and they may otherwise have overlooked. It’s She lives on her own in Walker. PB. $17.99 why does she have to witness these horrible a particular joy when I can recommend a small town in Finland This book took events? Messenger of Fear is a gruesome, something special to me, such as my friend and likes it that way. me by surprise. horrific novel, not only for the violence and Siobhan Stagg’s CD Hymne à l’amour, or She doesn’t trust My instinct is usually fears inflicted on the subjects, but also for Anna Goldsworthy’s book Piano Lessons. people and doesn’t like to pass on anything the serious and upsetting topics Michael to get involved in with an elaborate dress Describe your own taste in books. Grant tackles. This is a book about suicide, anyone else’s business. on the front cover, but I love immersive books; books that really bullying, homophobia and the choices you But when she discovers thousands of Euros this was thoroughly transport me to a time or place, allowing make that can change your life (and hanging in her school’s darkroom, she finds entertaining me to forget where I am completely. Elliot someone else’s) forever. A captivating read herself reluctantly becoming tangled in a melodrama. The Perlman’s The Street Sweeper is a good for ages 14 and up. KD dangerous web of crime, corruption and premise has a hint of example of this: I followed the characters underworld figures, where the price could The Handmaid’s Tale: girls born with a throughout time from Melbourne, to New very well be her life. This is a fast-paced, genetic mutation are taken from their THE INCREDIBLE York, Chicago and Poland, and at the end beautifully written contemporary thriller families and institutionalised, trained to be ADVENTURES OF of the book I felt as though I’d been on an that brings to mind the current wave of surrogates for the extremely wealthy CINNAMON GIRL enlightening and life-changing journey. Scandinavian crime. The author has already women who live in an area known as the Name a book that has changed the way Melissa Keil won the prestigious Topelius Prize in Jewel. From here we follow the story of you think, in ways small or large. Egmont. PB. $18.95 Finland for this novel, and it’s a must-read Violet, one of 200 girls being sold at Primo Levi’s If This Is a Man and The Truce for crime- and thriller-lovers. Luckily it’s auction, who is bought by a Duchess with Eden Valley is a had a huge impact on me and the way I the first in a trilogy, because I can’t wait to severe motives and a cruel streak. beautiful, small view the world. Levi’s factual retelling of get my hands on the next instalment. Violet is likeable and not too prissy. country town that has his time in a concentration camp and his Sometimes she’s seduced by the luxury of never seen much of journey following the liberation of the camp Angela Crocombe is from Readings St Kilda her prison, but mostly she’s down-to-earth, anything. Alba – lay bare the brutalities of the Holocaust and aspiring comic-book FALLING INTO PLACE terrified of the prospect of carrying a child, World War II. These memoirs put life into and yearning for a normal existence: love, artist and creator of perspective, and make me appreciate how Amy Zhang friendship and, most of all, the freedom Cinnamon Girl – can’t lucky I am here in Melbourne. HarperCollins. PB. $17.99 to choose her own destiny. The world- figure out why, after What’s the best book you’ve read lately When a car building is fairly light and there may be graduating high school, and why? she’s the only one of her friends who isn’t accident puts the cries of ‘insta-love’ over the romance, but I can’t go past Graeme Simsion’s The desperate to get out. If change is such a most popular girl in I found this to be a diverting soap opera. Rosie Project. I read it while living in good thing, why does she get this funny school, Liz Emerson, Highly recommended for ages 14 and up. London and felt totally transported back in hospital, it seems as feeling in her tummy every time she thinks Emily Gale is from Readings Carlton to my beloved home city. I studied at the about the future? if the whole school has University of Melbourne (and loved the Though, that was before some turned up to find out if APPLE AND RAIN place so much I’m back there now), have nut job predicted that the world was going she lives or dies. But enjoyed many delicious meals at Jimmy Sarah Crossan to end, and that teeny-tiny, off-the-map was it an accident or a Watson’s on Lygon Street, and could just Bloomsbury. PB. $16.99 Eden Valley would be the only place to suicide attempt? Why imagine strolling down Royal Parade as the It was Christmas survive the apocalypse. While the clock would the girl who appeared to have it all protagonist, Don Tillman, whizzes past on Eve when Apple’s is running out on Alba’s life, doomsday seemingly throw it all away? Written in his bike. non-linear flashbacks interweaved with mum walked out, turns out to be the least of her problems. scenes from the hospital as students wait, leaving her to be raised This is a story about embracing change Who has the best book cover? this is a fascinating and beautifully written by her grandmother. and understanding where fear of change The cover of Imogen Holst: A Life in Music debut about the impact our actions have Throughout the last 11 comes from. None of the characters want depicts the young woman with her arms upon one another. The author is barely years, not a moment to be vulnerable, so there’s a lot of hiding in the air and face glowing with a happy more than a teenager herself, but her has passed that Apple behind big personalities. It’s fun, in a smile. Is she dancing, or is she conducting wisdom and writing talent truly shine in hasn’t longed for her to goofy, nerdy kind of way. Recommended the musicians seated before her? Folk this heartfelt book that will have you return. Then one day for ages 14 and up. dancing and conducting were among she comes crashing back into Apple’s life, Holst’s main passions, and this cover desperate for a friend to read it so you can Kushla Egan is from Readings Carlton discuss it together. If you liked Thirteen with grand gestures and lots of promises. captures her very essence. 14 READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014

New Crime Dead Write New Non-Fiction with Fiona Hardy Book of the Month Crime Book of the Month THIS HOUSE OF GRIEF: THE STORY THE FEW OF A MURDER TRIAL Nadia Dalbuono Helen Garner Scribe. PB. Was $29.99 Text. PB. Was $32.99 $26.99 $29.99 Detective Leone Scamarcio is a straight cop with a bent It’s difficult to loudly sing the praises of a book that history: his father was a leading member of the Mob, and covers such a harrowing subject. I had anticipated the while he might not have inherited his father’s criminal release of Helen Garner’s new non-fiction since early in the inclinations, his father’s reputation hovers behind him like a year, though the title of the work, in itself, seems to request a shadow. Nevertheless, there’s one person who’s convinced of hushed reception. On Father’s Day in 2005, a car driven by his honesty – the police chief, who hands him a file that needs Robert Farquharson, carrying his three young sons, veered off to be kept quiet. A foreign minister has been photographed in the highway outside of Winchelsea and plunged into a dam. Farquharson swam to the company of a male prostitute, the politician has left town to hide from his mistakes, shore, but his children drowned. In This House of Grief, Garner follows the subsequent and the prostitute is now dead in his Trastevere flat, his body stabbed repeatedly. A murder trial, a case that stretched over eight years, and seeks to answer the camera is found in the room, and the pictures that are uncovered – well – they’re not incomprehensible: was Farquharson’s a deliberate act? pleasant. Soon, Scamarcio is trying to track down a killer, all the while without It would be misleading to say this is an enjoyable read, but it ripples with the disclosing what he’s doing, who asked him to do so, and who the extraordinarily strength of Garner’s prose: she portrays the courtroom vividly, bringing the parading high-ranked person is that asked it of the chief in the first place. Scamarcio’s search barristers, Farquharson’s indignant sisters and string of frustrated expert witnesses takes him from a corrupt and heated Rome to the sunny and relaxed island of Elba, all piercingly to life. Over the days that I read this book I felt like I sat there with her, where a young American girl has disappeared. The police on Elba are ill-equipped to behind the scrimmage of journalists, a sullen, sunken Farquharson just beyond my deal with the crime that has unfolded right on one of their famed beaches. From direct gaze. He is perhaps the haziest of characters here – Garner never speaks with four-star hotels and seedy alleyways, to a police force striving to do what’s right and the him or his immediate family. Though after finishing the book I’m stuck with the image Mafioso family that solves disturbing criminal problems without the red tape, unless it’s Garner paints of him holding a handkerchief to his wincing, puffed face. Small details around the throat – Scarmarcio’s journey is scenic and grim. like these are riveted to my memory, an effective technique of Garner’s. The detective’s frequent coffee stops must be the fuel behind the book’s relentless It takes time to feel Garner’s point of view. She positions herself as a divorced pace, and Nadia Dalbuono has the ability to throw out new information, red herrings, woman, and this tenders her narration with an interesting perspective as it suggests she loose-tongued suspects, and glimpses into both Scamarcio’s fractured past and current might feel sympathy, even just a thread, for the embittered ex-husband. Do we, as readers, grappling with his morals. Violence gets the job done, but – mostly – it’s the last route feel a flicker of this too? When the murder trial begins, Cindy Gambino, Farquharson’s he wants to take. There are a few loose ends to the plot that stay undone, but this is ex-wife, attests on the stand to belief in his innocence. The narrative turn comes in step the first in a two-book series. The Few is a rock-solid read, with the click-clack of shoes with the change in testimony of Gambimo, who, in the retrial three years later, says she on cobblestones and the oppressive heat of a Mediterranean summer making for a now believes Farquharson’s actions were intentional. We are jolted from the semantics of delectable spring treat. witnesses endlessly going over tyre treads in the grass, or misplaced yellow paint marks made by the Major Collision unit on the bitumen where the car was thought to have left the road, to something that feels closer to a truth, however elusive. This is a gut- YOU AN EVENT IN AUTUMN wrenching, tense study of a murder trial, brilliant in its precision and perception. Zoran Drvenkar Henning Mankell Belle Place is Editor of Readings Monthly HarperCollins. PB. $29.99 Harvill Secker. PB. $27.99 Zoran Drvenkar’s Sorry It might not be autumn was an unexpected here, but it’s certainly an willing to support anti-whaling outfits like dynamite stick of a event: a new Wallander, Environmental Studies Sea Shepherd and expensive ICJ court book that I loved, and so to speak – a novella cases than climate change initiatives? An here we have You, an originally published in BLOOD AND GUTS: interview with Malcolm Fraser, the prime unnerving tale that 2004 but now released DISPATCHES FROM THE minister who banned whaling in Australia starts 15 years ago with in English. Inspector in the late 1970s, produces some further a snowstorm that stalls Kurt Wallander wants to WHALE WARS food for thought: ‘people care more about traffic on Germany’s sell the apartment he Sam Vincent whales … than they do about refugees or Autobahn 4 for hours. lives in with his Black Inc. PB. $29.99 asylum seekers. That’s not necessarily a Once the storm clears, everyone moves daughter, Linda, who With print distinction we want to be proud of.’ along – apart from the 26 people alone in has recently joined the force, and buy a journalism on the Vincent delves thoughtfully into their cars who were murdered as the snow property in the country. He finally finds one decline it’s heartening both the Australian and Japanese cultures fell around them. In the present day, five that seems perfect until – in delectable to discover there’s still that perpetuate the whale wars and exposes girls balancing between youth and detective style – he literally trips over a very much a place for some uncomfortable truths from both sides. adulthood find a suitcase full of drugs and skeleton, dug up by his dog, in the property’s investigative journalism This is a timely and thought-provoking see a chance for change, but the suitcase’s long grass. With Linda’s help, he investigates in book form. book, and Vincent’s writing style is engaging owner sees otherwise. Disconcertingly told why the farmhouse he was determined to Australian writers in and not without humour (his time in in the second person, you will find this an invest in became the final resting place for particular are Antarctica with Sea Shepherd produces electric and tense read. the middle-aged woman buried under it. producing some some particularly hilarious anecdotes). Blood fantastic works of gonzo journalism: Anna and Guts is proof that good investigative PERFIDIA PERSONAL Krien, Jeff Sparrow and Helen Garner (to journalism is alive and well. Lee Child name just a few) have all recently published James Ellroy Kara Nicholson is from Readings Carlton William Heinemann UK. PB. $32.99 Bantam Press. PB. $27.99 brilliant books in this format, and I think At nearly 700 pages, Ex-army and off-the- Sam Vincent could now join their ranks. you might need a wrist grid Jack Reacher is on Blood and Guts is an eyewitness Biography brace to hold up the a bus when he sees the account of the ‘whale wars’, dispatches from first book in James message in a personals both a three-month stint on a Sea Shepherd Ellroy’s second LA ad: Jack Reacher call vessel and a trip to Japan to meet the whale DRESS, MEMORY Quartet series, but his Rick Shoemaker. He has hunters and those behind the Japanese Lorelei Vashti cigar-smoking, gum- to find a payphone to whaling industry. In March this year, A&U. PB. $27.99 popping, 1940s cadence do it (oh, Jack) and Australia took Japan to the International Reading Lorelei is one to ride with when he does, the call Court of Justice (ICJ) and won a case to ban Vashti’s Dress, abandon: he is a raises questions about Japan’s Antarctic whaling program. At the Memory feels akin to storyteller with a lot to say and with the best which sniper would be good enough to time, I listened to the ruling on the radio and spending time with a way of saying it. The day before the bombing shoot at the French president over 14 felt it was the right decision. After reading dear friend – the kind of Pearl Harbor, a chemist is held up, and hundred yards – it’s not him, but Jack this book, I now see there are many shades who might grip your Hideo Ashida – police officer, scientist, and Reacher knows everything. I’m not sure of grey to this issue and no easy answers. hand fiercely as they a Japanese man in a bad time to be Japanese what commas ever did to Lee Child to make Whales face far greater risk from climate talk, who could be in America – is there to witness it. Thus him avoid them so much, but credit where change (ocean acidification, melting ice) accused of over- begins a racially charged, frenzied few it’s due: Child’s punchy, immediate style is and general overfishing (300,000 cetaceans sharing but also weeks in LA, and Perfidia unfolds the exciting, and Jack Reacher is as tall, clever die annually from entanglement in fishing bravely reveals their private, personal narratives of three police officers and a and unwilling to commit to the twenty-first nets) than they do from whaling. So, world in the hope that the listener might young woman, each caught up in it all. century as they come. Vincent asks, why do Australians seem more READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 15 connect to their experiences in some way, allow him to understand why asylum and in turn, find comfort. seekers might choose to take the risk of This sort of openness and boat passage. Tragedy strikes when a boat warmth finds an easy home in Vashti’s sinks and he is the only remaining link in coming-of-age memoir. This is an the operation. Amari is racked with guilt exploration of her twenties, and she at the lives lost – which include two of his traverses this decade of her life through friends – and also at the prospect of facing the dresses she collected along the way, jail when he is about to start his own family, each with memories stitched into their and the story follows the legal and personal seams. From the opening sentence, ‘When struggles Amiri faces. I was twenty my heart started beating What I took away most from this so loudly it terrified me,’ Vashti lays her book is the selflessness in Amiri’s story. anxieties and self-doubts bare. Her stories Regardless of how difficult or hopeless are perceptive and relatable, and while his situation has become, he thinks of his each unique to her own life, the constant family, or other asylum seekers who are theme of figuring out who you are echoes depending on him, and ultimately accepts the experiences of so many twenty- his own fate. somethings – a period where you ‘expect Suzanne Steinbruckner is from Readings certain things to happen in a certain St Kilda way’, but where life doesn’t always go according to plan. THE CLIMB: There seems to be a Gen-Y CONVERSATIONS WITH memoir craze at the moment, potentially a trend that taps into a voyeuristic curiosity AUSTRALIAN WOMEN IN of other people’s lives. Yet reading POWER Vashti’s memoir is an inherently self- Geraldine Doogue reflective experience too. Dress, Memory is Text. PB. $32.99 comforting as well as entertaining because Iconic journalist and it assures readers that maybe it’s okay not television presenter to have things entirely figured out yet. Geraldine Doogue At the end of the day, maybe stumbling turns her attention to through your twenties actually makes for an issue central to our better stories, and a more comprehensive times: How are women understanding of your identity. Vashti represented at the top is a self-aware narrator and one who levels of power in knows how to aptly shape a structured, Australia? In personal compelling narrative out of a chaotic life. conversations with At its heart, Dress, Memory affirms that fourteen women all leading the way in their the possibilities for where you’re meant to chosen fields – as wide-ranging as business, go are open, and the choices are your own. politics, religion, education and the armed It’s a joy to read. forces – Doogue gets to the heart of what it Stella Charls is from Readings Carlton means to be a woman in power in contemporary Australia. The Climb reveals CONFESSIONS OF A a varied and at times quite unexpected PEOPLE-SMUGGLER portrait of the nation. Dawood Amiri HOW TO GET THERE Scribe. PB. $27.99 Maggie MacKellar I felt humbled to Vintage. PB. $32.99 read Dawood Amiri’s Confessions of In 2011 Maggie a People-Smuggler. He Mackellar moved from puts a human face to her family’s farm in the people who end up Central West New in the messy middle to South Wales to the east bottom end of the coast of Tasmania with people-smuggling her children and chain. It was less like I assorted menagerie to was reading Amiri’s story, and more like live with a farmer. In we were sitting in someone’s home, her second memoir she listening to him relay his life thus far. traces the joys and struggles as she and her Although the language is simple, the family settle into their new home – a sheep narrative is intimate. While this book tells farm in a stone house built by convicts in Amiri’s unique tale, it could also represent 1828. How to Get There is for anyone who the experience of many people whose lives has moved to a new place and struggled are lived in a mixture of fear, hope, duty, with feelings of homesickness and displacement. desperation and survival while they’re tanding firm on the other side trying to get from one place of violence THE GOOD FIGHT Sof the Anzac enthusiasts is a and persecution to a safer place, and the chorus of critics claiming that the Wayne Swan struggles they face in doing so. appetite for Anzac is militarising A&U. PB. $35 Amiri, an ethnic Hazara, travels our history and indoctrinating our to Indonesia with the hopes of boarding Despite the divisions children. So how are we to make a boat bound for Australia and seeking within the Labor Party, sense of this struggle over how we asylum. He has been chosen by his family Wayne Swan was able remember the Great War? Anzac, to make this journey, as he is skilled and to steer the Australian the Unauthorised Biography capable of earning some income. On economy through a provides a much-needed historical reaching Indonesia he does odd jobs to time of unprecedented perspective on the battle over earn the money to afford the boat fare; international Anzac. It traces how, since 1915, however, as he’s boarding the boat bound economic challenges. Australia’s memory of the Great for Christmas Island, he is caught and In this book he tells War has declined and surged, placed in detention. While the legal asylum how he nurtured an reflecting the varied and complex history of the Australian processing begins, time lags and little is economy that was the envy of the world, nation itself. Most importantly, it asks why so many accomplished. standing up to an opposition who fought Australians persist with the fiction that the nation was born Later, back outside, Amiri starts fiercely against Labor’s political agenda. on 25 April 1915. to work for the people-smugglers to earn His story provides unique access to the enough for his own passage to Australia. decision-making of a government whose www.newsouthbooks.com.au Compounded with this is Amiri’s own legacy of economic management and experience of the slow legal process, which social change is still to be fully recognised. 16 READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014

INSIDE THE HAWKE– Music REFUGEES Politics KEATING GOVERNMENT: Jane McAdam & Fiona Chong A CABINET DIARY UNSW. PB. $19.99 Gareth Evans THE HISTORY OF ROCK Jane McAdam and THIS CHANGES MUP. HB. Was $49.99 ’N’ ROLL IN TEN SONGS Fiona Chong reject the EVERYTHING $44.99 Greil Marcus spin and panic running Naomi Klein rampant through Allen Lane. PB. $29.99 As good as it gets in YUP. HB. $39.95 Australian politics and Released 17 September Australian politics. When Greil media to provide a That’s how the Marcus’s editor Here, Naomi Klein balanced account of Hawke–Keating suggested he write a exposes the myths that Australia’s asylum Government is now history of rock ’n’ roll, are clouding climate policies in light of widely regarded. But he not surprisingly felt debate. One is that the international law. how did this highly it was ‘a terrible idea, market will save us, Written for a general audience and using able, ambitious, that it had been done when in fact the real-life examples, Refugees explains what strong-willed group to death’. Thankfully, addiction to profit and policies like offshore processing, work through its crises Marcus did not shy growth is digging us in mandatory detention and turning back and rivalries, and achieve what it did? from the task; instead, he reinterpreted it deeper every day. boats mean in practice. Gareth Evans’s diary, written in the entirely. As our finest bridge between rock Another is that mid-1980s and published now for the first journalism and academia, Marcus is humanity is too greedy to rise to this time, is the consummate insider’s account. unrivalled in his abilities: he picks over the RACE AND challenge but in fact, around the world, the It not only adds much new material to the sacred bones of rock ’n’ roll, in the end RECOGNITION: fight back is already succeeding in ways both historical record, but is perceptive, sharp more of a soothsayer than an archaeologist, QUARTERLY ESSAY 55 surprising and inspiring. Klein argues it’s and unvarnished in its judgments, lucidly revealing the hidden pathways that Noel Pearson about changing the world, before the world changes so drastically that no one is safe. written, and often highly entertaining. connect between culture, society, theory Quarterly Essay. PB. $19.99 and mysticism. In the new Quarterly Without spinning the well-worn THE TERRORIST’S SON MY GRANDFATHER’S Essay, Noel Pearson prayer wheels of nostalgia and epiphany GALLERY shows how the idea of Zak Ebrahim with Jeff Giles that characterise most other personal Anne Sinclair ‘race’ was embedded in S&S. PB. $11.99 histories, Marcus deliberately avoids the Text. PB. $32.99 the Australian Zak Ebrahim was only songs and singers who might seem almost seven years old when In 1940, Paul constitution, and the compulsory (Elvis, the Beatles, Bob Dylan), his father El-Sayed Rosenberg, a European distorting effect this and includes some that are almost certainly Nosair shot and killed art dealer, has had on Australian destined to remain obscure or cultish (the the leader of the disembarked in New culture and politics. Flamin’ Groovies, Christian Marclay), Jewish Defense League York, one of hundreds Now, he considers there may be a chance to thereby leading us into new territory. He in 1990. While in of Jewish refugees change this situation for the future. His parses obscure meanings and resonances prison, Nosair then fleeing Vichy France. essay seeks to show what constitutional from these ten songs, recorded between helped plan the As he fled, dozens of recognition means and what it could make 1956 and 2008, which unveil a sort of bombing of the World Trade Center in his paintings – modern possible: true equality and a renewed parallel narrative to orthodox rock history, 1993. In The Terrorist’s Son, his son dispels masterpieces by appreciation of an ancient culture. one that has hitherto remained submerged. the myth that terrorism is a foregone Cézanne, Monet, Sisley and others – were Each of the 10 songs have a conclusion for people trained to hate. This seized by Nazi forces and the art dealer’s talismanic quality, catalysts for Marcus’s Cultural Studies is the first book in the TED Books series. own legacy was eradicated. More than half idiosyncratic interpretation – the Teddy a century later, Anne Sinclair uncovered a Bears’s saccharine wedding ballad ‘To box filled with letters. Drawing on her Know Him Is to Love Him’ becomes a BAD FEMINIST Education grandfather’s correspondences with sort of prism, refracting the public and Roxane Gay Picasso, Matisse, Braque and others, private histories of Phil Spector and Amy Constable & Robinson. PB. $29.99 Sinclair paints a picture of modern art on CLASS ACT Winehouse (the song’s infamous author In these funny and both sides of the Atlantic. Maxine McKew and its troubled interpreter) via one of insightful essays, Winehouse’s inspirations, 60s girl group MUP. PB. $19.99 THE UPSIDE OF DOWN Roxane Gay takes us the Shangri-Las. Likewise, Joy Division’s through the journey of Through a series of Susan Biggar ‘Transmission’ acts as a galvanic totem, her evolution as a conversations and case Transit Lounge. PB. $29.95 a segue between the pre- and post-punk woman (Sweet Valley studies, Maxine McKew Susan Biggar’s first son eras, drawing Albert Camus, the Sex High) of colour (The documents the arrived with fierce blue Pistols, the Kray twins and Graham Help) while also taking transformation that’s eyes and cystic fibrosis. Greene into its vortex. Marcus has written readers on a ride now underway in The doctors said he both an essential volume of contemporary through culture of the classrooms around would be lucky to reach history, and a hugely readable last few years (Girls, Django in Chains) and Australia and examines the age of 30. Then, a investigation of rock music’s esoteric commenting on the state of feminism the strategies that are job offer snatched the underbelly – its unknown pleasures. today (abortion, Chris Brown). The helping to lift academic family from New Tam Patton is from Readings Carlton portrait that emerges is not only one of an performance. Class Act invites reflection on Zealand and deposited insightful woman continually growing to one of our most pressing national dilemmas them in a whole new understand herself and our society, but – how we replicate success across a medical world. Here, Susan’s second baby Australian Studies also one of our culture. fragmented educational system and reverse was also born with cystic fibrosis. Her story the decline in student performance. is one of belief and deciding to be joyful. TRIUMPH AND DEMISE History HITLER’S LAST WITNESS Paul Kelly Science Rochus Misch MUP. HB. Was $49.99 Scribe. PB. $32.99 $39.99 VILLAGE OF SECRETS Caroline Moorehead MIND CHANGE After being seriously In this inside account of Susan Greenfield the Labor Government Chatto & Windus. PB. $35 wounded in the 1939 Rider. PB. $35 Polish campaign, from 2007 to 2013, In the mountains of the In Mind Change, Susan Rochus Misch was veteran journalist Paul southern Massif Central Greenfield investigates invited to join Hitler’s Kelly probes the in France lie a number the all-pervading Schutzstaffel (SS) dynamics of the Rudd– of tiny, remote villages technologies of modern bodyguard. There he Gillard alliance and united by a particular life and reveals how served until the war’s dissects what tore story: during the Nazi this new environment end as Hitler’s them apart. Neither a occupation, the is causing minds to bodyguard, courier, Rudd nor Gillard inhabitants of Le physically adapt – to orderly and finally, chief of communications. partisan, Kelly writes with a keen eye and Chambon-sur-Lignon essentially ‘rewire’ Misch knew the private side of Hitler, and sharp pen, and his investigations show that and the other villages of themselves. Mind this first-hand testimony of the last witness both were brought down by their personal the Plateau Vivarais Lignon saved several Change is intended to incite debate as well as to Hitler’s final hours offers an intimate flaws and entrenched rivalry. He also thousand people from the concentration yield the way forward. In her accessible style, view of life deep inside the bunker. With an examines Tony Abbott: ruthless, camps. Moorehead has travelled widely to Greenfield offers new insights on how to introduction by historian Roger Moorhouse. underrated, measured, pragmatic. interview these people and gain access to archives that few have seen. improve our mental capacities and wellbeing. READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 17

Art & Design each featured project – a practical and Food & Gardening HUNGRY FOR THAT inspirational guide for anyone who sees Raph Rashid sustainability not as limiting, but rather as a with Margaret Snowdon with Chris Gordon Hardie Grant. HB. $39.95 creative opportunity. Is this book Melbourne KAZIMIR MALEVICH HEIRLOOM VEGETABLES: TRAINING DAYS personified? A little Achim Borchardt-Hume (ed.) A GUIDE TO THEIR groove, a hearty feed, Tate. PB. $59.95 Henry Chalfant & Sacha Jenkins HISTORY AND VARIETIES maybe some cool This book accompanies T&H. PB. $24.99 Simon Rickard patterns on the the first comprehensive In the late 1970s, New Lantern. HB. $49.99 packaging and some retrospective staged in York City was Certainly if you have hip-hop tunes to match the UK at Tate Modern, bankrupt, dirty and ever been fortunate that fish burger! Off the and explores the career dangerous. Born on enough to eat at Annie back of his famous food of a truly radical artist, these grimy streets, Smithers’s eponymous trucks – Beatbox Kitchen and Taco Truck one whose work still graffiti rapidly made its restaurant then you – Raph Rashid has taken his passion for influences artists today. The publication mark. Here, 12 have eaten vegetables street food to the next level. Celebrating his investigates the artistic and ideological role legendary graffiti grown by the author of unique brand of Melbourne–Californian Kazimir Malevich played during a period of writers – the original this book, Simon cooking, the recipes in Hungry for That are extreme social and political upheaval. As subway artists whose creative genius Rickard – both a mash-up of punchy flavours and fresh Russia’s most influential avant-garde artist, fuelled the earliest flowering of the Smithers and Rickard are great gardeners, combinations with a hint of urban attitude Malevich’s style of severe geometric movement – give first-person accounts of and Rickard knows a lot about vegetables. thrown in for good measure. Raph’s first abstraction, which he called suprematism, their experiences. Individually interviewed Heirloom Vegetables is a rich history of publication also walks you through the was a precursor to the development of for this book, they reveal an authentic, heirloom varieties. There is talk of trade basics for creating the freshest salsas and constructivism. This book includes unparalleled insight into the golden age of wars and the means for peace, and it all sauces. The most perfect gift for those accessible essays by leading art historians, graffiti. Illustrated with Henry Chalfant’s revolves around carrots. No, not really, but wanting street cool in their own kitchen. lavish illustrations that comprises paintings, original photographs, this book captures all this book does revolve around what has drawings and sculpture, as well as the the raw, explosive creativity of that era. been eaten, developed and now lost, as food DIG DEEPER teaching charts he used to explain his ideas. production is increasingly controlled by Meredith Kirton HIDE AND SEEK multinational corporations more interested Murdoch. HB. $49.99 TSUYOSHI MAEKAWA Sofia Borges, Sven Ehmann & in profit than flavour. This extraordinary Finally a practical, Koichi Kawasaki Robert Klanten (eds) book is a lively, passionate encyclopaedia of easy-to-read gardening MER. Paper Kunsthalle. HB. $95 DGV. HB. $92.50 edible gardening. manual written for the Tsuyoshi Maekawa is Following Rock the Australian seasons – and one of the few living Shack, Hide and Seek JAMIE’S COMFORT FOOD it’s not the size of a former members of the showcases a range of Jamie Oliver house. Guiding you Gutai Art Association, charming and elegant Michael Joseph. HB. Was $55 through the seasons, Japan’s most important hideouts that satisfy the $44.95 each chapter is divided yearning to escape avant-garde group Did you know that into four parts: annuals, perennials and bulbs; urban routines and find (1954–1972). This book Jamie receives 4.5 grasses, groundcovers and climbers; shrubs peace and quiet. These is the first monograph million unique page and trees; and herbs, fruit and vegetables. imaginative structures meld traditional about Maekawa. It views per month on There are also step-by-step projects that are architecture with modern living in brings together many historic images and his website? That somewhat simple if you have a knack for that fascinating and surprising ways, offering their documents of the Gutai period, found in the website does have sort of thing, plus ideas for feature plants, owners shelter from hectic lives. Whether archives of the Ashiya City Museum of Art some of these recipes and advice on everything from the more located in the forest or on the water; whether & History, and contains an unpublished included, but still, unusual cultivars to using grey water. light and minimalistic or dark and cozy, the interview with Maekawa, as well as an there is nothing like dwellings exemplify how to create remote essay by Shoichi Hirai, chief curator at the curling up with a book titled Comfort Food SALAD DAYS: PENGUIN shelters for retreat and renewal. Kyoto Museum of Modern Art, placing the and making huge, world-shattering SPECIAL artist in an international artistic context. 11"X17" READER decisions like will it be moussaka or Ronnie Scott should we go straight to puddings? Penguin. PB. $9.99 HOW TO WRITE ABOUT Elisa van Joolen Brilliant, easy, delicious recipes are there Melbourne-based Onomatopee. PB. $49 CONTEMPORARY ART for the taking, over and over. Jamie Oliver, author Ronnie Scott Gilda Williams 11” x 17” Reader is an the bloke who has done more to change has given us a fair T&H. PB. $24.95 ongoing project that the way we think about food than pretty mouthful in this This is the definitive examines and much anyone on the planet, has not engaging essay on our guide to writing challenges the fashion forgotten the importance of a simple bowl general obsession with engagingly about the industry’s prevailing of pasta and an early night. Phew. food. He references fine art of our time. value systems. Through food restaurants, the Invaluable for students, the reuse of samples, BISTRONOMY absurd and the divine, arts professionals and stock and archive items Katrina Meynink and the philosophers of donated by various other aspiring writers, Murdoch. HB. $49.99 food writing, including fashion brands, Elisa van Joolen developed the book navigates I just love the new Stephen Poole. He defines eating out in two new series of products that are both readers through the generation of chefs Melbourne as a place where we tend to conceptual and wearable: a series of unique key elements of style who speak loud and pride ourselves on sharing meals. This is a ‘11"x17" Sweaters’ and hybrid ‘inside-out’ and content, from the aims and structure of clear, apparently droll essay, vivid in its reckoning of sneakers and sandals. 11"x17" cuts through a piece to its tone and language. This is straight to us all. They inner-urban Melbourne folk while the fashion system and opens new brimming with practical tips that range hear that we want simultaneously questioning our motives. I perspectives in clothing production, across the complete spectrum of art- quality food, simply beg each of you to read this glimpse of our branding, values and intellectual property. writing, from academic essays to press done and at any time. time, if only to stop the food porn. releases and news articles; and from texts KNIFE AND FORK This book is a celebration of all those for gallery guides to op-ed journalism and chefs answering our pleas for less pomp THROUGH THE SEASONS exhibition reviews. Robert Klanten & Anna Sinofzik and more generosity, please. Bistronomy is Annabel Langbein (eds) the name of the new game: this is haute HarperCollins. HB. $49.99 DGV. HB. $92.50 BUILDING BETTER cuisine for the people – served in convivial All the recipes in Sofia Borges, Sven Ehmann & Knife and Fork: Visual surrounds, where food and community, Through the Seasons are Robert Klanten (eds) Identities for rather than the thread count of the designed to make the DGV. HB. $92.50 Restaurants, Food and tablecloth, are what matters. Katrina most of every season’s Building Better: Beverage is a showcase Meynink, an Australian blogger, author produce – from the Sustainable Architecture of unconventional visual and all-round food-lover, has pulled lightest summer salads for Family Homes offers identities from the together young and sassy chefs from all to the most decadent an insightful world of eating, drinking over the world (including 30 from winter puddings. There exploration of the latest and hospitality. The Australia, with representation from are many gluten-free and vegetarian options, developments in featured examples prove that even small Carlton’s The Town Mouse and as well as hundreds of Annabel’s cooking sustainable design. It enterprises can create big design concepts. Northcote’s The Estelle) to put their best and gardening tips and tricks. The book is an inspiration for anyone recipe forward. What you get is an also takes an in-depth Meet Annabel Langbein at Readings thinking about founding their own company authentic and innovative ride of over look at the high-performance building Hawthorn on Wednesday 24 September, 6pm materials and technical data involved in or redefining an existing one and giving it an 100 recipes. unforgettable look. 18 READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 Picture Books Junior Fiction ON SUDDEN HILL SPUD & CHARLI Linda Sarah & Benji Davies (illus.) Samantha Wheeler S&S. HB. $19.99 UQP. PB. $14.95 A box is a wonderful thing. Of Charli dreams of owning a horse; course, it’s useful for if she could only learn to ride and transporting things, but its most win the gymkhana she might convince charming uses are when it’s a robot, her parents to buy her one. It’s a big house or a spaceship, really anything challenge but Charli has determination your imagination wants. Birt and Etho in spades – especially when it comes to are old friends who climb up Sudden Hill with their boxes horses. So when she finally makes it to and play many games. One day another child with his box her first riding camp, her excitement wants to join them. He has fine box ideas too but as the breaks from a trot to a gallop. But an saying goes ‘two’s company, three’s a crowd’ and Birt ‘feels untamed imagination can be a strange’ about sharing his friend and so begins to avoid dangerous beast, especially when it starts jumping to them. However, who can hold out against the allure of ‘an conclusions. Through a series of misadventures Charli incredible monster creature box thing’ and eventually two finally learns to harness her mind to discover a larger world. friends become three and that feels good. Exploring the A delightful canter through a world of horses, riding universal themes of friendship, sharing and creativity, On and gymkhana, Spud & Charli offers some important lessons Sudden Hill also shows you can never underestimate the about life, community and nature. The author of the charming potential of a box. For ages 3 and up. Smooch & Rose (shortlisted for the 2014 Readings Children’s Alexa Dretzke is from Readings Hawthorn Book Prize) has given us a story any animal enthusiast is sure to love. Highly recommended for ages 7 and up. HELLO FROM NOWHERE Athina Clarke is from Readings Malvern Raewyn Caisley & Karen Blair (illus.) Viking. HB. $24.99 Eve and her dad live on the Middle Fiction Nullarbor Plain and she loves it ‘in the middle of nowhere’. She loves RETURN OF THE PADAWAN, STAR the wildlife, the ever-changing WARS: JEDI ACADEMY BOOK TWO tourists, the locals and the freedom. Jeffrey Brown However, she misses her nan and Scholastic. PB. $12.99 wants her to visit, but Dad says, ‘Nan won’t come out After surviving his first year at Jedi here, she thinks it’s the back of beyond.’ Though one day Academy, Roan Novachez thought his the bus does bring Nan and finally Eve can show her all second year would be a breeze. He the wonderful things about living in Nowhere. This is couldn’t have been more wrong. This such a sweet story about a young girl who loves her life year, Roan will have to face alien poetry and wants to share it with the grandmother she adores. tests, menacing robots, food fights, For ages 3 and up. AD flight simulation class, online bullies, more lightsaber duels, and worst of all, GUS & ME: THE STORY OF MY a girl who is mad at him. Roan feels like GRANDDAD AND MY FIRST he’s drifting apart from his friends but when the school bullies take him under their wing, he GUITAR decides they aren’t so bad after all – or are they? Keith Richards & Theodora Richards (illus.) Hachette. Book+CD. $28.99 FRANK EINSTEIN AND THE Long before there was a band, there ANTIMATTER MOTOR: BOOK ONE was a boy: a young Keith Richards, Jon Scieszka & Brian Biggs (illus.) who was introduced to the joy of Abrams. PB. $11.99 music through his beloved granddad, Frank Einstein is planning Theodore Augustus Dupree, something very big for the affectionately known as Gus. Gus & school science fair. He is busy with his Me is a unique autobiographical pair of intelligent robots, Klink and picture book honouring the special bond between a Klank, making an ‘Antimatter Motor’ grandfather and grandson. Includes photographs from the in his grandad’s garage. All is well until Richards family collection and an exclusive audio CD. T Edison appears – Frank’s arch nemesis and a known villain – with his LOUISE LOVES ART eyes also on the science fair prize. This Kelly Light clever novel is the first in a new series HarperCollins. HB. $24.99 that combines action-packed stories with well-explained Meet Louise. Louise loves art more and accessible science, great characters and plenty of Jon than anything. It’s her imagination on Scieszka’s much-loved hilarity. There are illustrations, the outside. She is determined to create graphs, diagrams and even sign language by way of an a masterpiece – her pièce de résistance! oddball chimpanzee. A fantastic and very fun read for Louise also loves Art, her little brother. budding scientists aged 8 and up. This is their story: a celebration of the Kim Gruschow is from Readings Hawthorn brilliant artist who resides in all of us and a reminder of the importance of HOW TO SAVE THE UNIVERSE IN creativity in all its forms. 10 EASY STEPS THE RESCUE ARK Allison Rushby Susan Hall & Naomi Zouwer (illus.) A&U. PB. $12.99 National Library of Australia. HB. $18.99 Cooper thinks his twin sister, Molly, is a real bore until the day The Rescue Ark is travelling around she tells him the end of the world is at Australia helping endangered animals: hand unless Cooper can save it. No wombats, parrots, potoroos, quolls and pressure, of course. Molly is an alien, as many more make their way onto the is their dog, Jack, and new friend, Hale, Ark. Firstly, have fun tracing the Ark’s and they’re all here to help Cooper and journey on the colourful map of protect him from the other aliens who Australia and reading about the are desperately trying to kill him. Oh, animals that will be collected on its way around the coast. and nobody actually knows how he will Then, help the animals onto the Ark by singing or reading do it, but they’re sure he’ll figure it out in time. Because if the rhymes. he doesn’t, then the intergalactic bounty hunters will come READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 19 Story Time Each week, Readings’ staff or special guests will read their favourite picture books for pre-school children (0 to 6 years old). For half an hour after Story Time, Readings offers a 20% Book of the Month discount on all full-priced children’s books. MAGISTERIUM: THE IRON TRIAL Cassandra Clare & Holly Black Readings Carlton Mondays 11am – 11.30am Doubleday. PB. $22.99 Call’s father always warned him that magic school was bad news, and so when Readings Malvern the time comes to take the Iron Trial entrance exams, he tries his hardest to Fridays 10.30am – 11am fail. But despite his natural talent for mayhem, Call passes and is enrolled in the Magisterium against his wishes. Once he’s immersed in this magical world, Call Readings St Kilda learns he has a very powerful enemy – the same enemy who killed his mother and Saturdays 10.30am – 11am now threatens the people closest to him. Saturday 6 September When you’re dealing with a book about a boy fighting an evil wizard and attending Tai Snaith will read from Sticks & Stones, Animal Homes. magic school, the Harry Potter comparisons are unavoidable – even more so Snaith presents animal habitats around the world, each in when one of the authors, Cassandra Clare, wrote Harry Potter fanfiction her own inimitable style. before becoming a household name. And the thing is, this first book in the Please note: all children must be accompanied by an adult as Magisterium series does feel a lot like Harry Potter with some Percy Jackson- this is not a child-minding service. style characters thrown in for good measure: think the Philosopher’s Stone with a darker, snarkier Harry. But once you get past that, you’ll find the similarities are not necessarily a bad thing. Memorable characters paired with a plot full of twists and turns make The Iron Trial WHERE CAN I GO?: AMAZING the perfect book for readers 9 and up wanting a little more CITIES Hogwarts-like magic in their lives. Maggie Li Holly Harper is from Readings Carlton Anova. HB. $24.99 A one-stop guide to 28 great cities, featuring a detachable compass. Packed with information, colour illustrations and educational fun, join Penguin as he travels through some of the most amazing cities in the world. Each city has its own double-page spread Did you know ... ? including a map of the central district, showing sites, Peppa Pig’s father, Daddy Pig, cultural information, hot spots and famous landmarks. works as an architect. He loves car trips and reading the paper! New Reference and destroy him and everything else on the planet, which MINI POM-POM PETS: MAKE YOUR looks fairly similar to earth but actually isn’t. Concerned OWN FUZZY FRIENDS yet? Good, because Cooper is freaking out! This is a Klutz hilarious story about the end of the world, and the 10-year- Kids’ Scholastic. HB. $24.99 old entrusted to save it, that will have you laughing and Make a tiny menagerie of soft, fluffy panicking all at the same time. little pets. It’s as easy as twirling a Angela Crocombe is from Readings St Kilda dinner fork! Step-by-step instructions and colour-coded charts show you LOOT: HOW TO STEAL A how to make mini pom-poms; you add Books eyes, a nose, ears, a tail, even rosy FORTUNE cheeks, for a little critter with big Jude Watson THE 52-STOREY TREEHOUSE Andy Griffiths & Terry Denton (illus.) personality. This craft kit contains the Scholastic. PB. $16.99 yarn, eyes, and more than 150 punch-out parts – enough PanMac. PB. Was $12.99 On a foggy night in Amsterdam, a man to personalise a whole petting zoo of adorable critters. falls from a rooftop – it’s Archibald $9.99 McQuinn, the notorious cat burglar. Andy and Terry’s amazing treehouse As he’s dying, Archie manages to get has 13 new levels including a chainsaw- out two last words to his young son, juggling level, a make-your-own-pizza Classic of the Month March: ‘Find jewels.’ But March learns parlour, a rocket-powered carrot- MY FAMILY AND OTHER that his father is not talking about launcher, a life-size snakes and ladders hidden loot. He’s talking about Jules, game, a remembering booth, a Ninja ANIMALS (50TH ANNIVERSARY the twin sister March never knew he Snail Training Academy and a high- EDITION) had. No sooner than the two find each tech detective agency, with all the Gerald Durrell other, they’re picked up by the police and sent to the latest high-tech detective technology, Puffin. PB. $14.95 world’s worst orphanage. March and Jules have no including a hot-doughnut vending Somewhere between novel intention of staying put. They know their father’s business machine! Well, what are you waiting for? Come on up! and autobiography, My Family inside and out – just one good heist and they’ll live the life and Other Animals is the story of of riches and freedom that most kids only dream about ... 10-year-old nature enthusiast Non-fiction Gerald Durrell and his family’s ESCAPE FROM WOLFHAVEN four-year migration from England to CASTLE: THE IMPOSSIBLE QUEST THIS IS THE WORLD Corfu in the 1930s. Gerald’s BOOK ONE Miroslav Sasek enthusiasm for the natural world Hardie Grant. HB. $55 Kate Forsyth finds the perfect outlet on the island and the book is filled with his richly Scholastic. PB. $7.99 A compilation of abridged versions of M Sasek’s most popular children’s detailed descriptions of the local flora and fauna, as well In the first book of a new series, travel books. From London to Hong as hilarious tales of the behaviours of the other members Wolfhaven Castle has been attacked Kong, Sydney to San Francisco, of the Durrell family. Each chapter is devoted to a new and only four escape capture: Tom, readers will delight in this charming local find, ranging from the mating habits of tortoises trained to scrub pots, not fight; Elanor, journey. With deft strokes of his to the best way to get a free lunch from the locals. the lord’s daughter; Sebastian, a paintbrush and a witty voice to This book is an absolute delight to read. With a knight in training; and Quinn, the match, M Sasek captured the essence fascinating cast of characters, both human and animal, witch’s apprentice. Somehow, if they of the world’s major capitals and and the beautifully evocative way that life on Corfu is are to save their people, these unlikely brought them to life. Now, more than 50 years later, recounted, the more you read about Gerald’s life, the heroes must find four magical beasts those same readers are passing these stories down to more you will feel your own is highly inadequate. from legend and awaken the sleeping their children and their children’s children. This series warriors of the past. But first, they have to make it out of Ruth Pirrett is from Readings Hawthorn has officially reached iconic status. the castle alive. 20 READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014

A TIME OF THE ONE SUN ONE CHARLIE AND GIFTS GLORIOUS MOON THE Patrick Leigh VEGETABLES Hetti Perkins, Margie CHOCOLATE Fermor OF ITALY West & Theresa FACTORY PB. Was $24.99 Domenica Marchetti Willsteed (eds) (POP-UP Now $13.95 HB. Was $120 HB. Was $39.95 BOOK) First published in 1977, Now $29.95 Now $24.95 Roald Dahl this great travel classic From rock shelters dating back 20,000 Domenica Marchetti pays tribute to Italy’s HB. Was $24.95 recounts an epic journey. In 1933, at the years, to politically inspired contemporary many glorious vegetables, from the bright, Now $14.95 age of 18, Patrick Leigh Fermor set out on orange-fleshed pumpkins of autumn to the prints, the artwork of the Aboriginal an extraordinary journey by foot – from cultures is recognised for its beauty and Amazing pop-up visuals along with lift- tender green fava beans of early spring. the-flaps and more bring Roald Dahl’s the Hook of Holland to Constantinople. A Organised by course, this book lauds cultural significance. This illustrated Time of Gifts is the first volume in a trilogy volume features contributions by 25 of timeless classic to life in a swishwifflingly the latest dining trend – the vegetable’s new way. This story of the young Charlie recounting the trip, and Fermor takes the starring role at the centre of the plate. the field’s leading scholars as well as 16 reader with him as far as Hungary. interviews with key contemporary artists. Bucket, a rare golden ticket and a mysterious, eccentric chocolate factory THE owner is a tale of exuberant invention, THE TIMES LUMINARIES AT ELIZABETH COMPRE- DAVID’S nonsense and fantasy. Eleanor Catton HENSIVE HB. Was $45 TABLE THE SKATING ATLAS OF Now $24.95 Elizabeth David RINK HB. Was $49.95 THE WORLD It is 1866, and Walter Roberto Bolaño Now $24.95 Times Atlases Moody has come PB. Was $24.99 HB. Was $295 to make his At Elizabeth David’s Now $12.95 Table is a must-have Now $89.95 fortune upon the New When Nuria Marti, cookbook for home The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World Zealand goldfields. On the the beautiful Spanish cooks and gourmets reflects today’s world with an illustrated night of his arrival, he figure skater, is suddenly alike. Featuring section on contemporary themes, from stumbles across a tense dropped from the Olympic team, a besotted 12 chapters that climate to economy, fully up-to-date gathering of 12 local admirer builds a secret ice rink for her in traverse from tasty reference maps that provide exceptional men, who have met the ruins of an old mansion on the outskirts soups and starters, detail. Now in its thirteenth edition, this in secret to discuss of their seaside town. Rife with political through to meat, corruption, sex, jealousy and frustrated authoritative world atlas continues to be a series of unsolved Bargain fish and desserts, passion, The Skating Rink is a darkly a benchmark of cartographic excellence, crimes. The winner of this cookbook is also atmospheric tale of murder. relied upon by governments and the 2013 Man Booker interspersed with some organisations worldwide. prize, The Luminaries Table is written in pitch-perfect of David’s short essays: THE ORPHAN BETWEEN THE historical register, richly how to cook ‘fast and fresh’ MASTER’S WOODS AND evoking a mid-nineteenth century using store-bought and pantry SON world of shipping and banking, and ingredients, evocative portraits of French Adam Johnson THE WATER and Italian markets, and more. goldrush boom and bust. HB. Was $39.95 Patrick Leigh Now $14.95 Fermor THE VERY THE The winner of the PB. Was $24.99 CLASSICAL HUNGRY Now $13.95 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, The TRADITION CATERPILLAR Orphan Master’s Son follows a young Picking up from the bridge across the BOARD GAME man’s journey through the world’s most Danube where A Time of Gifts ended, Anthony Grafton, mysterious dictatorship. Adam Johnson Patrick Leigh Fermor travels on, across the Glenn W. Most & Eric Carle has constructed a portrait of a world great Hungarian Plain on horseback and Salvatore Settis Mixed Media. Was $26.95 Now $16.95 heretofore hidden from view: a North over the Romanian border to Transylvania (eds.) Korea rife with corruption and casual in this second volume of his epic travel HB. Was $69.95 Eric Carle’s tale of The Very Hungry Now $29.95 cruelty, but also camaraderie and stolen memoir. Fermor’s account provides a Caterpillar comes to life in this fantastic moments of love. coherent understanding of the dramatic The legacy of ancient Greece and Rome board game. Featuring bright illustrations, events then unfolding in Middle Europe. has influenced every culture that followed, the game takes children on a journey of and in this comprehensive volume, some transformation as their caterpillar develops THE ZENITH HOW PROUST 500 articles by a wide range of scholars from egg to a beautiful butterfly. Duong Thu Huong CAN CHANGE investigate the afterlife of this rich heritage. HB. Was $39.95 BEST-KEPT Now $14.95 YOUR LIFE THE INFINITY SECRETS OF Acclaimed Vietnamese Alain de Botton OF LISTS author and political PB. Was $24.99 ITALY Umberto Eco Gordon Kerr dissident Duong Thu Now $13.95 Huong is known for her HB. Was $59.95 HB. Was $39.95 In How Proust Can unflinching portraits of modern Vietnam. Now $29.95 Now $19.95 Change Your Life, In The Zenith, she offers an intimate, Umberto Eco reflects Gordon Kerr’s Best-Kept Secrets Of Italy is a Proust’s life and work are transformed by imagined account of the final months in the on how the idea of perfect read for the armchair traveller who Alain de Botton into a no-nonsense guide life of President Ho Chi Minh, imprisoned catalogues has changed over the centuries wants to enjoy the pleasures of la dolce vita. for all manner of things: enjoying your at an isolated mountaintop compound. and how it has expressed the spirit of the From the sophisticated, vibrant cities to the vacation, reviving a relationship, achieving His story is mixed with that of his wife’s times. His essay is accompanied by a wide simple elegance of the countryside, Italy’s original and un-clichéd articulation, being brother-in-law, and an elder in a small selection of works of art illustrating the culture abounds along with an exuberance a good host, and understanding why you village town. texts presented. This new illustrated essay for life and its simple pleasures. should never sleep with someone on a is a companion volume to Eco’s previous first date. works, On Beauty and On Ugliness. THE BETTER WASHINGTON: A LIFE PARIS OUT OF ANGELS OF FLORENCE Ron Chernow HAND OUR NATURE BROADHURST Stephen Pinker HB. Was $49.95 Karen Elizabeth Now $20 Helen O’Neill HB. Was $39.95 Gordon HB. Was $39.95 Now $16.95 Celebrated biographer HB. Was $27.95 Ron Chernow provides Now $19.95 In his myth-destroying Now $13.95 a nuanced portrait of book, shortlisted for This replica of a the ‘father of the United States of America’ With full-page prints of Florence 2012’s Samuel Johnson Prize, Pinker reveals nineteenth-century travel book – replete in his crisply paced narrative through the Broadhurst’s distinctive fabric and how, contrary to popular belief, humankind with illustrations of sights you will never see great man’s troubled boyhood, his feats in wallpaper designs, together with has become progressively less violent and maps of a different era – guides readers the French and Indian War, his creation photographs of interiors using her pattern, over millenia and decades, arguing that through the Paris that is, that might be and of Mount Vernon, his presiding over this deluxe edition of Helen O’Neill’s book modernity and its cultural institutions are that never was. Amid the Parisian locales the Constitutional Convention and his is stunning. Broadhurst led an eccentric actually making us better people. performance as America’s first president. you know and love, unheard-of temptations life from her birth in rural Queensland to abound in this rare and rowdy exploration of her murder in her Paddington wallpaper a Paris one can only wish existed. showroom at the age of 78. New books are regularly added to our website – visit the bargains page at readings.com.au for more. READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 21

New Film & TV THE TUNNEL $39.95 DVD of the Month with Lou Fulco When a prominent French politician is found dead on THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL PERSONS OF INTEREST: the border between the THE ASIO FILES Was $39.95 UK and France, detectives $32.95 $49.95 Karl Roebuck (Stephen The Grand Budapest Hotel is Wes Anderson’s brilliant Using previously secret Dillane) and Elise eighth feature film. It recounts the escapades of the ASIO files and surveillance Wassermann (Clémence marvellous Monsieur Gustave H. (Ralph Fiennes), concierge of film, this award-winning Poésy) are sent to investigate on behalf of the movie’s titular hotel in the fictitious Republic of Zubrowka (a series shares the untold their respective countries. Adapted from European alpine state). For me, an avid fan of Anderson’s films, personal stories of four popular Danish series The Bridge, The this could well be his pièce de résistance, and for someone who ‘Persons of Interest’ – Gary Tunnel is a satisfying new series for crime has seen all of his movies a minimum of eight times, that’s saying something. If I had Foley (Black Panther), lovers that, while it draws obvious to compare The Grand Budapest Hotel with another Anderson film it would be on par Frank Hardy (Communist), Michael Hyde parallels with the original, also brings with The Royal Tenenbaums (2001): the characters are rich and enjoyable, and the (Monash revolutionary) and Roger Milliss something thrillingly new to play. The script is gorgeously amusing and witty. Anderson’s pedantic perfectionism is, as (journalist). Winner of Best Documentary performances by Dillane and Poesy have always, on show here, from the symmetrical compositions to the tiny details that at the Film Critics Circle and nominated for also attracted much praise. make his movies so wonderfully re-watchable. a Walkley Award, Persons of Interest is much more than a history series; it casts a DEATH OF A PILGRIM ‘For me, an avid fan of Anderson’s films, this could well be his pièce de light on today’s culture of fear. $34.95 Available 10 September résistance …’ FADING GIGOLO Based on books by Swedish The film alternates between 1932, during the heyday of the luxury hotel, $39.95 criminologist and author Available 9 September opulent in the Jugendstil (German Art Nouveau) style, to 1968, after the hotel Leif G.W. Persson, this has ‘begun its descent into shabbiness’, which is shown through the more brutal Murray (Woody Allen) suspense-filled drama International style. In both cases the details of interior and exterior are phenomenal. talks his friend Fioravante series is about the 1986 The Grand Budapest Hotel boasts incredible casting: Fiennes carries the movie with (John Turturro) into assassination of former (L’Air de) panache and charm, and his characterisation of M. Gustave is a pleasure to becoming a gigolo as a way Swedish Prime Minister Olof behold. Relative newcomer Tony Revolori is brilliant as the hotel’s lobby boy and M. of making some much Palme – a crime that remains unsolved today. Gustave’s faithful sidekick. Jeff Goldblum, Tilda Swinton, Willem Dafoe and Saoirse needed cash after an Twenty years after documents accuse Palme Ronan are all excellent as well. This is a lush and remarkable film that is sure to be out-of-the-blue request of working for the CIA after WWII and later enjoyed. Perhaps you will sit down to watch it with a fresh-baked batch of Mendl’s from his dermatologist. With Murray acting selling out to the Soviet Union, the Swedish Courtesan au Chocolat, or just a glass of chilled water with no ice. as Fioravante’s ‘manager’, the duo quickly National Bureau of Investigation embarks finds themselves caught up in the on an extensive police investigation. Soon, a George Munn is from Readings Hawthorn cross-currents of love and money. surprising line of enquiry develops. BILLY CONNOLLY’S BIG ONLY LOVERS LEFT WALLANDER: VOLUME 5 ROMEO & JULIET SEND OFF ALIVE $49.95 $39.95 $29.95 $29.95 Available 10 September Available 10 September Scottish comedian and Available 10 September The final piece of Shakespeare’s timeless tale actor Billy Connolly In his modern Wallander, adapted from of star-crossed lovers is explores the changing interpretation of vampire Henning Mankell’s brought back to life by attitudes, beliefs and mythology, director Jim Inspector Kurt Wallander Julian Fellowes, the approaches towards the Jarmusch brings together novels, is out this month. award-winning creator of world of death. As Tilda Swinton and Tom This Swedish crime drama Downton Abbey. Filled with Connolly immerses himself Hiddleston for a sexy, stars Krister Henriksson lush, enchanting imagery in a range of experiences – dabbling in stylish, blood-soaked ride, as the grizzled cop who has seen some amid its original setting in Verona, the death’s customs and meeting those working set against the crumbling beauty of Detroit tough times, though he’d never let that classic tale of romance remains as timeless within the industry – he reflects on how his and Tangier. Adam, a depressed underground bother him; he’s hard as a rock when it and as powerful as ever. This release stars own attitude is shaped by these musician, reunites with his lover Eve, but comes to the slings and arrows. Smart Douglas Booth and Hailee Steinfeld as experiences, with his pal Eric Idle. Billy their romance, which has endured for scriptwriting matched with Henriksson’s Romeo and Juliet, as well as an exceptional Connolly’s Big Send Off makes for centuries, is disrupted by the arrival of Eve’s very fine performance perfectly re-creates supporting cast including Paul Giamatti, fascinating viewing. reckless little sister (Mia Wasikowska). the tone of Mankell’s books for the screen. Damian Lewis and Ed Westwick.

Boyhood What We Do in the Shadows The Infinite Man Filmed over 12 years with the same cast (including Ellar Coltrane, Flatmates Viago, Deacon, and Vladislav are three vampires who After an anniversary weekend goes terribly wrong, scientist Dean Ethan Hawke and Patricia Arquette), Richard Linklater's BOYHOOD are just trying to get by in modern society. The new film from Taika (Josh McConville) is spurred to his greatest scientific achievement is a groundbreaking story of growing up as seen through the eyes Waititi (Boy, Eagle vs Shark) and Jemaine Clement (Flight of the yet: the invention of time travel. of a child named Mason. Conchords) is wickedly clever and wildly entertaining. Director: Hugh Sullivan Director: Richard Linklater Directors: Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement Release date: September 18 (MA15+) Release date: September 4 (M) Release date: September 4 (M)

Melbourne’s home of quality arthouse and contemporary cinema 380 Lygon Street Carlton cinemanova.com.au 22 READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014

New Music weapon, as powerful as it is tender, and she employs it here to perfection. The album Album of the Month also features guests Seun Kuti and Brian Eno, and the title is inspired by Facebook Pop & Rock COO Sheryl Sandberg’s ‘Ban Bossy’ LULLABY AND … THE CEASELESS campaign – a global initiative that ROAR SUKIERAE encourages girls to lead. Robert Plant $21.95 Tweedy THERE THERE $21.95 With all the renewed interest in Led Zeppelin, firstly Available 19 September Megan Washington following their 2007 reunion shows and again on the $21.95 re-release of their first three albums a few months ago, you might Released 12 September think their iconic vocalist would be interested in rekindling those old fires for a When the band Megan Washington’s triumphant reformation album. Not so. Even after guitarist Jimmy Page’s recent Uncle Tupelo broke latest album, There There, declaration that he was ‘fed up’ with Plant withholding on further reunions, Plant has up 20 years ago, Jeff is inspired by the lush been firm: ‘I’m not part of a jukebox!’ This refusal to dwell on past glories has always Tweedy went on to form sounds of new-romantic been fed by a desire to continually evolve and explore new musical pathways, and the Wilco. Over the years since 80s pop and these 14 last decade has seen Plant grow exponentially as an artist. Lullaby and … is another he has introduced us to heartbreakingly songs are as infectious as ever, with honest fascinating step forward. beautiful songs that are rich with aching lyrics – as Washington explains, every The album has a trance-like core – a mesmerising landscape of drone and sorrow or pure unbridled joy. Since the song is a real story and every lyric is about percussion that draws the listener in, embodying Plant’s familiar epic lyrical themes: early Americana of A.M. and Being There, someone real. If her debut album, I Believe heroism, romantic longing, the quest. His singing has never been better, and the howls Wilco have gone on to forge new heights in You Liar, was the diary of a wide-eyed and screams of old are exchanged for a deeper, more controlled intensity. The band’s experimentation in song craft. Whether or youth dizzy with romance, There There is not the shift in style kept you on the ride, the chronicle of a woman discovering the the undisputed fact is that Tweedy has ‘The album has a trance-like core – a mesmerising landscape of drone and moral complexities of love, with hooks to become one of the most daring and percussion that draws the listener in … ’ spare. accomplished songwriters of our generation. Now he joins forces with his music complements this perfectly; the cyclical banjo motif of opening track ‘Little son (and drummer), Spencer, and a slew of MUE Maggie’ recalls Zeppelin’s ‘Gallows Pole’, until a solo from Gambian riti player Juldeh musicians, plus other members of Wilco, to Émilie Simon Camara transports us to another realm entirely. Similarly, ‘Embrace Another Fall’ builds bring us Sukierae. $19.95 a brooding atmosphere of loss before the song is blown wide open with a massive guitar On first listen, these 20 songs Mue is the fifth album riff from regular collaborator Justin Adams. sound and read like a Tweedy solo project from French pop Certainly the spectre of Led Zeppelin looms over proceedings (how could it but then you get involved, and invested, songstress Émilie Simon, not?), but what is impressive is Plant’s ability to appreciate and assimilate the influence and hear the beautiful interplay between revered for her of those who’ve come after him: Jeff Buckley and Jack White come to mind, as do instruments and voice. The album starts charismatic stage Tinariwen, Peter Gabriel and Massive Attack. Personally, I’m happy for any reunions to with the sonically textured ‘Please Don’t presence and rich, organic sounds. stay on hold if he keeps making records of this calibre – it’s one of his very best. Let Me Be So Understood’ and moves into Infusing live instrumentation with layers the mellow but rich ‘High as Hello’. Okay, of intricate electronic, Mue is an album of Tam Patton is from Readings Carlton so these tracks aren’t so removed from epic songs inspired by and about the city of the Wilco of today. But from here, the Paris. Each song is crowned with Émilie’s acoustic guitar and voice take front and beautiful signature vocals. centre position, and we are thrown back to LOOK AGAIN TO Émilie Simon will perform songs from Mue at Jazz &Blues material more circa Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. THE WIND: JOHNNY Readings Carlton on Friday 12 September, 5pm Tracks like ‘Kamera’ and ‘War on War’ CASH’S BITTER TEARS come to mind, and are no more apparent REVISITED SKE-DAT-DE-DAT: THE than when hearing the first single (and Country Various SPIRIT OF SATCH beautifully animated film clip) ‘Summer $19.95 Dr. John Noon’. When Tweedy says that this is Johnny Cash 1964’s Bitter $24.95 a solo album performed by a duo, I say SINGLE MOTHERS Tears: Ballads of the Dr. John is New Orleans’ we’ll take it any way we can. It really is a Justin Townes Earle American Indian is most prominent living beautiful listen. $21.95 arguably his most musical icon – the Lou Fulco is from Readings Hawthorn Available 5 September significant release – a embodiment of his concept album focusing on the hometown’s freewheeling BRILL BRUISERS It’s been quite the mistreatment and marginalisation of the creative spirit and multiple musical The New Pornographers turbulent 32-year Native American people throughout the traditions. So it’s fitting that the musician $21.95 journey for JT Earle, who history of the United States. Now, 50 years pays tribute to another larger-than-life is surely one of modern after this album was recorded, a collection New Orleans legend: the seminal trumpeter Americana’s brightest and vocalist Louis ‘Satchmo’ Armstrong. Brill Bruisers is the first of artists has come together to reimagine shining talents. After several stints in rehab Ske-Dat-De-Dat: The Spirit of Satch features new release in four years these songs for today’s audiences. Crafted it seemed, at times, that the burden of an 13 classic numbers drawn from various from acclaimed by producer Joe Henry, Look Again To the all-too-famous father coupled with a phases of Armstrong’s five-decade career, supergroup, the New Wind: Johnny Cash’s Bitter Tears Revisited self-destructive streak might be his all updated while still maintaining the Pornographers, who NPR features music from Kris Kristofferson, undoing, but a newly sober and newly magic of the original music. Dr. John is calls ‘virtually peerless in the world of Emmylou Harris, Steve Earle, Bill Miller, married Earle seems to have found joined by a stellar supporting cast. power-pop and indie rock’. The band’s Gillian Welch with David Rawlings and contentment and a clarity that permeates leader and main songwriter AC Newman Norman Blake (the guitarist and only the 10 tracks on his wonderful fifth album, DIFFERENT SHADES describes Brill Bruisers as a celebration surviving member from the original Single Mothers. record. Massively melodic, joyous pop recording sessions). OF BLUE The album was recorded live, helmed by the soaring vocals of Neko Joe Bonamassa without overdubs or session players to Case, Dan Bejar and Newman himself – BITTERSWEET $21.95 accompany Earle’s four-piece touring band not since their 2005 release, Twin Cinema, Kasey Chambers Available 12 September in an effort to capture the moment and the has this supergroup sounded so $19.95 Different Shades of Blue is honest, personal nature of this new batch deliriously, goofily happy. Signifying a new phase in Joe Bonamassa’s first of songs. Opening track ‘Worried Bout her exciting and expansive studio album to feature the Weather’ sets an intimate tone, with I’M NOT BOSSY, I’M THE career, Bittersweet sees solely original material. Earle displaying a vulnerability not often country-music veteran Sporting a new BOSS heard in his music. The songs ‘Picture in a Kasey Chambers enter the experimental edge, this is a blues record Sinéad O’Connor Drawer’ and ‘It’s Cold in This House’ see studio without her producer, brother and that explores the outer reaches and the $19.95. Deluxe edition $24.95 Earle accompanied only by his guitar and good luck charm Nash Chambers, for the many different sounds that shape the genre. the gorgeous pedal steel of Paul Niehaus, first time. Pulling together a superb studio To compliment Bonamassa’s signature I’m Not Bossy, I’m The Boss to great effect. On the upbeat ‘My Baby band – including Bernard Fanning, Ashleigh guitar style and vocals, producer Kevin is the tenth studio album Drives’ you can almost see the ear-to- Dallas, Dan Kelly, Matthew Engelbrecht, Shirley has brought together a group of from iconic Grammy ear grin on Earle’s face as he brags about Declan Kelly and her father Bill Chambers musicians including Reese Wynans, award-winning Irish having a baby who’ll drive him to church on – and sticking to her trademark no-nonsense Carmine Rojas, Michael Rhodes, Anton Fig, singer-songwriter, Sinéad Sunday and to see his momma every other live recording style, the album was recorded Lenny Castro, Lee Thornburg, Ron Dziubla, O’Connor. Passionate and direct, yet with an Monday! Contentment indeed. in just seven days. The ballsy, brassy result is the Bovaland Orchestra, Doug Henthorn overarching fragility, O’Connor’s voice is a Declan Murphy is from Readings St Kilda testament to Chamber’s songwriting talents. and Melanie Williams. READINGS MONTHLY SEPTEMBER 2014 23

Fabulous Classical Box Set Sale BACH-BACHIANAS: ARCHIV PRODUKTION: MUSIC BY THE BACH THE EARLY MUSIC STUDIO Up to 70% off. Over 100 titles available. Hurry, only while stocks lasts. FAMILY Various BACH: CANTATAS AND MOZART: COMPLETE Reinhard Goebel DG. 4791045. 55CDs DG. 4790377. 5CDs Was $159.95. Now $69.95 SACRED MASTERPIECES OPERAS – SALZBURGER Was $39.95. Now $19.95 A celebration of pioneering John Eliot Gardiner FESTSPIELE Reinhard Goebel and early music label Archiv, DG. 4778735. 22CDs Various Musica Antiqua Köln’s this set presents a range of Was $132.95. Now $59.95 DG. 0734600. 33DVDs recordings of Bach are recordings from across the This set features the Was $209.95. Now $79.95 classics of the Early Music label’s entire 66-year classic recordings of the This set of all 22 Mozart movement, and equally history. The beautiful presentation and Christmas Oratorio, St operas, as performed at the revelatory is their championing of the original jacket sleeves all attest to the Matthew’s Passion, St 2006 Salzburg Festival, music of the Bach family. customary high standards of the label. John’s Passion and Mass in marks a milestone in the B minor, along with a selection of 37 history of Mozart performance and KIRSTEN FLAGSTAD BEETHOVEN FOR ALL cantatas, odes and motets. includes notable rarities, many of which are EDITION (DELUXE EDITION) now on DVD for the first time. Daniel Barenboim VIOLIN MASTERWORKS Kirsten Flagstad Decca. 4783930. 10CDs Decca. 4783608. 19CDs+1DVD Various THE WESTMINSTER Was $69.95. Now $29.95 Was $136.95. Now $59.95 Decca. 4781149. 32CDs LEGACY VOLUME 1: This collection brings This limited-edition set Was $122.95. Now $49.95 THE CHAMBER MUSIC together Kirsten Flagstad’s contains the complete Composer and virtuoso COLLECTION complete Decca recitals piano sonatas, the piano violinist Vivaldi is probably Various made in the 1950s, of concertos and the nine one of the best known symphonies of Beethoven. DG. 4806945. 59CDs Brahms, Schubert, Grieg composers of the baroque Includes the documentary, Beethoven For Was $239.95. Now $99.95 and more. Flagstad is also a highly regarded period. This collection All, and a 64-page hardback photobook. Over the 16 years of its Wagnerian soprano, and this set features contains both his most popular works and her in several Wagner excerpts. some of his lesser known, yet finest. existence, Westminster BEETHOVEN released hundreds of WAGNER: DER RING DES Herbert von Karajan BALLET MASTERPIECES recordings, creating a vibrant mosaic of classical music. Its famous NIBELUNGEN DG. 4779830. 13CDs Various single-microphone ‘Natural Balance’ Sir Georg Solti Was $59.95. Now $24.95 Decca. 4781526. 35CDs technique established a distinctive Decca. 4783702. 17CDs+1DVD A legend for his Was $114.95. Now $49.95 sound and a consistency in quality, Was $324.95. Now $129.95 interpretations of This set contains the ensuring the technique became Solti outdid himself on this Beethoven, Herbert von world’s favourite ballets renowned worldwide. recording of the complete Karajan recorded a large and ballet suites Ring Cycle, which is often swathe of the composer’s performed by some of the MARRINER & THE described as the greatest oeuvre during his lifetime. His complete greatest orchestras and ever made. In this newly Beethoven repertoire is presented here for conductors, including the Royal Opera ACADEMY: 20TH remastered deluxe edition, the beauty of the first time. House Orchestra, English Chamber CENTURY CLASSICS Solti’s interpretation cannot be denied. Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra and others. Neville Marriner THE ALL-BAROQUE BOX Decca. 4782759. 10CDs MOZART: VIOLIN & WIND Various VERDI: SIX GREAT Was $79.95. Now $34.95 DG. 4790441. 50CDs A distinguished series of CONCERTOS OPERAS Was $149.95. Now $69.95 recordings of the late Various Claudio Abbado The great names of nineteenth- and Decca. 4784271. 9CDs DG. 4790379. 14CDs Monteverdi, Vivaldi, twentieth-century Was $59.95. Now $26.95 Was $79.95. Now $34.95 Rameau, Handel and Bach repertory established Mozart saw wind Claudio Abbado’s Verdi are included in this set, Marriner and the Academy as classics of instruments as having their recordings with La Scala, with vespers, concertos, the gramophone. This fiftieth anniversary own voices, full of Milan, have gained iconic operas, cantatas, oratorios and passions edition presents a selection of these albums tenderness, while his violin status over the course of galore. There are also classic recordings of that ranges from Wagner to Stravinsky, concertos are full of sparky time. In this set they are Gabrieli, Biber, Lully, Purcell and Corelli. Bartók to Shostakovich. virtuosity. This collection brims over with presented in their complete form for the some truly authoritative performances. first time, with the full synopses included. THE JOHN ELIOT VOICE OF THE CENTURY GARDINER COLLECTION VERDI: THE COMPLETE Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau COMPLETE DECCA DG. 4790780. 23CDs+2DVDs John Eliot Gardiner WORKS STUDIO RECITALS Was $123.95. Now $59.95 DG. 4791044. 30CDs Various Joan Sutherland These Dietrich Fischer- Was $102.95. Now $42.95 Decca. 4784916. 75CDs Decca. 4783243. 23CDs Dieskau recordings for In this set John Eliot Was $226.95. Now $89.95 Was $102.95. Now $44.95 Deutsche Grammophon Gardiner presents a This is the first ever Decca pays tribute to Joan are among the great challenging list of classics, complete collection of Sutherland with this treasures of the twentieth- ranging from Monteverdi Verdi’s compositional complete set of her studio century. This set covers his prolific output to Stravinsky, as well as output: operas, arias and sacred works; the recitals. The set comes of songs and song cycles, as well as taking in the Baroque Greats, the Viennese chamber and piano pieces; the orchestral, with a 48-page booklet performances in opera and sacred music. Classics, the Romantics and a number of ballet and choral works; plus a host of containing an appreciation of Sutherland gramophone. This fiftieth anniversary modern composers dear to his heart. rarities. by prominent critic George Hall. edition presents a selection of these albums.

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