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READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 3

News

THE READINGS FOUNDATION GRANTS ANNOUNCED The Readings Foundation has announced grants totalling $93,000 to support a range of projects and organisations within Victoria in 2016. This year the Readings Foundation grant funding will focus strongly on organisations that provide targeted grassroots assistance with literacy and education to the most disadvantaged Victorian communities. Readings donates 10% of its overall profit to The Readings Foundation each year, and the generous donations from Readings’ customers make a crucial contribution. The successful grant recipients for this year are: 3081 Angels ($10,000), Brotherhood of St Laurence ($11,750), Church of All Nations ($18,000), Mallee Family Care ($20,000), Melbourne Indigenous Transition School ($8,250), Preston Reservoir Adult Community Education ($20,000), and Victorian Indigenous Literary Festival on Australian authors. Host Isobel Moore Readings shops and online at readings.com.au. ($5,000). Readings will also continue to is the Children’s Specialist at Readings Offer ends 29 February 2016. support the Wheeler Centre Hot Desk St Kilda. She is a theatre producer and Fellowships for 2016. Please visit performer, loves to travel and takes both INDIE BOOK AWARDS SHORTLIST readings.com.au/the-readings-foundation for Harry Potter and Judy Blume VERY more information on each funded project. seriously. The first YA Book Club will be Showcasing another year of great held at Readings St Kilda on Wednesday 17 Australian writing, the Indie Book Awards February, from 7pm-8pm, where we’ll be have announced the category shortlists BLAK & BRIGHT – THE VICTORIAN discussing Lady Helen and the Dark Days for the best Australian books of 2015. The INDIGENOUS LITERARY FESTIVAL by Alison Goodman. Goodman calls her shortlisted titles for the fiction categories 2016 novel ‘Pride and Prejudice meets Buffy in are The Natural Way of Things by Charlotte Passionate about Indigenous culture, stories English high society’. For more information Wood (Allen & Unwin), The Secret Chord and books? Curious? This is your festival. please contact Isobel at Readings St Kilda by Geraldine Brooks (Hachette), The Featuring masterclasses, panels, readings, on 03 9525 3852 . The Book Club is free, but Other Side of the World by Stephanie launches, a musical gala and more, this first please book at readings.com.au/events. Bishop (Hachette Australia) and A Guide Blak & Bright Victorian Indigenous Literary to Berlin by Gail Jones (Random House). The debut fiction shortlist includes Rush Festival will be coming to Melbourne’s READINGS STORY TIMES The Wheeler Centre from 18–21 February. Oh! by Shirley Barrett (Macmillan), Salt Readings offers free weekly half-hour story Throughout the festival you’ll have the Creek by Lucy Treloar (Macmillan), time sessions at our Carlton, Malvern and opportunity to hear from a range of writers Relativity by Antonia Hayes (Penguin) St Kilda stores, with the aim of promoting and storytellers, including Emma Donovan, and The Anchoress by Robyn Cadwallader Readings Monthly literacy and encouraging a love of books Bruce Pascoe, Anita Heiss and Ellen van (HarperCollins). Find out more about the Free independent monthly newspaper and bookshops in our newest generation. published by Readings Books, Music & Film Neerven. Most events are free. For more shortlists for other categories (non-fiction, These sessions commence at 10am on information, or to book tickets, head to children’s and young adult) at indies.com.au. Fridays at Readings Carlton, 10.30am Editor blakandbright.com.au. Readings is a proud The category winners and overall Book on Thursdays at Readings Malvern and Elke Power supporter of Blak & Bright. of the Year winner will be announced on [email protected] 10.30am on Saturdays at Readings St Kilda. Wednesday 23 March. To thank parents and children for attending Editorial Assistant READINGS BOOK CLUBS story time, Readings offers a 20% discount Alan Vaarwerk The Queer Book Club is back at Readings off all full-priced children’s books for [email protected] St Kilda for 2016, dedicated to fiction and half an hour after the completion of each select non-fiction books that represent story time session. Our children’s book Advertising aspects of LGBTIQ life. For more specialists would be happy to assist you in Stella Charls information about the book club, or to choosing books for your family, whatever [email protected] make a booking, please contact Amy their age, reading ability or interests. Please (03) 9341 7739 at Readings St Kilda on 03 9525 3852 note, this is not a child-minding service. We or [email protected]. The ask that parents stay with their children for Graphic Design Contemporary Fiction Book Club is also the reading. Cat Matteson [email protected] coming back to Readings St Kilda this year. For more information or to make a 20% OFF OXFORD DICTIONARIES booking, please contact Belle at Readings Front Cover & REFERENCE BOOKS St Kilda on 03 9525 3852 or belle.katavatis@ Readings Monthly cover design by Cat Heading back to school? To help you Matteson.. readings.com.au. Sessions for both book clubs will commence in February. get prepared for the academic year, we are offering 20% off a select range Cartoon of Oxford dictionaries and reference Oslo Davis READINGS YA BOOK CLUB books in our shops and online. The sale oslodavis.com Kicking off this February, the Readings includes English dictionaries, foreign Readings donates 10% of its profits each YA Book Club is an informal monthly language dictionaries, pocket dictionaries, year to The Readings Foundation: gathering for enthusiasts of all ages to thesauruses and more. The sale is on in- readings.com.au/the-readings-foundation discuss young adult literature with a focus stock items only while stocks last at all

Oxford Dictionary Sale /ˈɒksfəd/ˈdɪkʃ(ə)n(ə)ri/seɪl/ noun 1. Readings are offering 20% off a select range of Oxford dictionaries and reference books in our shops and online. The sale is on in-stock items only, while stocks last. Offer ends 28 February 2016. “get ready for the school year with the Readings Oxford Dictionary sale!” 4 READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016

Mark’s News and views from Readings’ Managing Director, ‘The ease with which the pope speaks Say Mark Rubbo to the concerns of ordinary people… Those of you who know me will be well aware of how pleased I am with The Readings is rooted in a heartfelt sense of humility.’ Foundation and the projects it supports. Since we started in 2009, we’ve given away almost The New York Times $1 million. The money comes from Readings’ profits, some private donations, and the gold coin donations our customers make when we gift-wrap their purchases. The gift- For the first time, in an intimate and personal wrap donations alone add up to around $25,000 per annum. The Foundation supports organisations working in the areas of literacy and the arts, with an emphasis on literacy conversation with Vatican reporter Andrea projects. At the moment the focus is on supporting projects in Victoria, but we do support Tornielli, Pope Francis reveals the core the Indigenous Literacy Foundation which works in remote communities in Northern of his papacy and his message for the Australia and SEAM, a literacy project in Papua New Guinea set up by the writer Drusilla Holy Year of Mercy, 2016. Modjeska. In 2016 we are providing ongoing support for several of our previous partners, including Mallee Family Care who support marginalised families in Mildura through their Reading Discovery program, which focuses on language, literacy, school readiness and resilience building. A grant from The Readings Foundation will again enable Carlton’s Church of All Nations to extend their successful after-school Family Learning Program. The program will expand to include adult literacy, holiday programs, pre-school transitions and tertiary support. Another of our longstanding partners is the Brotherhood of St Laurence. The Foundation is supporting the organisation again in 2016 through their literacy project, the Home Interaction Program for Parents and Youngsters (HIPPY). HIPPY works with children and families, often for whom English is not the primary language, to deliver a hugely successful home-based early learning and parenting program. We’ve also supported the Wheeler Centre’s Hot Desk Fellowships for the last 4 years and we’ll support them again this year. The Fellowships provide writers with a space to write at the Wheeler Centre and also offers them a small stipend. I’m very excited that two Hot Desk Fellows have books coming out this year: Jennifer Down’s novel, Our Magic Hour, is out next month with Text, and Rajith Savanadasa’s novel, Ruins, will be published by Hachette in July. A new Foundation grant recipient is the Melbourne Indigenous Transition School (MITS) and our grant will help them build their library. We met recently with the school’s executive director, Edward Tudor, who told us about the objectives of the school, which has its first intake this year. Many families in remote communities would like their children to have wider educational opportunities which are often not easily accessible. Individual city schools and programs have offered scholarships for Indigenous pupils, but with mixed success. Students from remote communities thrown straight into a city school often struggle to adapt to the curriculum and the new lifestyle away from friends and family. The MITS is a residential school in inner-city Richmond; students attend classes at facilities at the Richmond Football Club. The MITS curriculum concentrates on building the students numeracy and literacy skills so they can confidently move to a more traditional school in the second year of the program. While at MITS, the students live in a caring residential environment with kids from similar backgrounds where their culture and their individual needs are respected. The inner-city location was a deliberate choice: ‘We want the students to have a real city experience, to learn to confidently move around a city,’ said Tudor. The people behind the school have years of experience as educators – it’s an inspiring project to be involved with. Brian Johns passed away last month. Brian had a distinguished career in journalism, as the Sydney Morning Herald’s Canberra bureau chief, and in broadcasting, first as director of SBS and then as managing director of the ABC. But I knew Brian in his role as publishing director at Penguin Books, a role Brian held from 1979 until 1987. Brian, although an experienced journalist, had no publishing background when he took on the role and his appointment was a bold move by Penguin’s then managing director, Trevor Glover. Brian came from a working-class Queensland family; highly intelligent, he was an avuncular character who loved ideas and creativity and he was especially passionate about Australian ideas. He came to Penguin at a time when Australian publishing was at its most exciting; Australians were writing their own stories and homegrown presses like McPhee Gribble and Outback Press were leading the charge. Brian jumped right into this and although Penguin was a commercial giant, he was keen to see that these new works were published and, to some extent, didn’t care who published them! He and Glover were instrumental in devising a scheme that enabled McPhee Gribble to expand their list, and out of that house came such classics as Helen Garner’s Monkey Grip and Tim Winton’s Cloudstreet. One of Brian’s first big books was an art history title, Rebels and Precursors by Richard Haese. This was about the social movements of Melbourne in the 40s and 50s, and the artists who portrayed the working class and the underprivileged. Often party members or socialists, these artists included Albert Tucker, Yosl Bergner, Danila Vassilieff, Sidney Nolan, John Perceval and Noel Counihan. It was a book about the clash of ideas – perfect for Brian. Brian’s intellectual and personal generosity was inspirational and the impact he had on modern Australian publishing and writing is immeasurable. My friendship with Brian helped me to form my ideas about what Readings should be and how it should become an advocate for Australian writing. He was the first ‘big’ multinational publisher I’d met. In those days, the big publishers only seemed interested in stopping Readings selling books we’d imported from the US, so it was a surprise and a pleasure when one day, shortly after he’d started with Penguin, Brian walked in and asked, ‘What’s selling?’ It was to become a regular refrain. Brian loved to tell the story of that visit and how he’d gone back to the Penguin offices and told them he’d been to ‘beaut bookshop’ – his colleagues were aghast as Readings was notorious as a ‘troublemaker’. I’m looking forward to my conversation with Barry Jones on Wednesday 17 February about his new book, The Shock of Recognition, which is about the books and music that have inspired him – the list is pretty long and reflects his passion for the great works of the Western tradition. Please come along, Barry is a remarkable, erudite man. READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 5

February Events February Launches

AN EVENING PERTH WRITERS Join us for the launch of the speculative 22 SOIREE WITH THE 25 FESTIVAL COMES crime thriller Incite Insight by Robert New. TO MELBOURNE: WOMEN Wednesday 3 February, 6.30pm SERAPHIM TRIO Readings Hawthorn Performing together for over twenty years, WRITING WRONGS Anna Goldsworthy, Helen Ayres and Timothy Together with literary journal Kill Your Andrew McDonald will launch Leanne Hall’s Nankervis are widely recognised as one of Darlings, we’re thrilled to offer an evening of wonderful new novel for children aged 9 and Australia’s most refined and experienced trios. wicked humour, featuring three wildly witty LESLEY HARDING up, Iris and the Tiger. Join us for a celebration To celebrate their album Beethoven Piano Trios, women straight from Perth Writers Festival. 11 & KENDRAH of this surrealist mystery story and a fantastic we are delighted to offer an opportunity to bask Join Helen Ellis (American Housewife), journey through life, art and family. MORGAN WITH in their music, followed by a discussion about Virginia Reeves (Work Like Any Other) Thursday 4 February, 6.30pm CHRISTINE their work with Readings’ own Lisa MacKinney. and Fiona McFarlane (The High Places) in Readings Carlton GORDON discussion with Kill Your Darlings online Tickets are $40 and include a copy of Beethoven editor Veronica Sullivan. Lesley Harding and Kendrah Morgan are Piano Trios. Please book at readings.com.au/events Join us as Mike Shuttleworth launches curators at Heide Museum of Modern Monday 22 February, 6.30pm Tickets are $10. Please book at Glenda Millard’s powerful new novel for Art, and are the co-authors of two books The Lido Jazz Room, 675 Glenferrie Road, readings.com.au/events young adults, The Stars at Oktober Bend. about this amazing place. Their new book Hawthorn Thursday 25 February, 6.30pm–8pm Saturday 6 February, 4pm together, Modern Love, is an intimate Church of All Nations, 180 Palmerston Street, Readings Hawthorn biography of John and Sunday Reed. Carlton Join Lesley and Kendrah in conversation with Readings’ own Chris Gordon for a Come along to the launch of Grand Slam, discussion of art and love. SIMON SEBAG Kathryn Ledson’s third novel featuring 26 MONTEFIORE ON accidental heroine Erica Jewell. Tickets are $15 and include a glass of wine and THE ROMANOVS Tuesday 9 February, 6.30pm $10 off the book on the night. Please book at Readings Hawthorn readings.com.au/events Straight from Perth Writers Festival to you, Thursday 11 February, 6pm–7.30pm hear Simon Sebag Montefiore talk about Readings Hawthorn his new book and the surreal lives of the Join us as Ellie Marney launches two new Romanovs. A British journalist, historian, YA novels: Justine Larbalestier’s My Sister ALYCE PLATT television presenter and award-winning Rosa, and Kirsty Eagar’s Summer Skin. SATYAJIT DAS ON 18 PLAYING FROM author, his book Jerusalem: The Biography Free, but please book at THE GLOBAL remains one of the world’s most popular [email protected] 11 HER NEW ALBUM, CREDIT CRUNCH history books, and his new book The Wednesday 10 February, 6.30pm FUNNY LITTLE Romanovs is set to become another classic. Readings Carlton A Banquet of Consequences was one of our WORLD top ten non-fiction books of 2015 and is Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events We are truly excited to have the wonderful a lively exploration on why the world is Friday 26 February, 6.30pm Join us for a laugh and rumination at the Alyce Platt playing a few tunes from her entering a period of prolonged economic Readings Hawthorn launch of Aaron Patrick’s Credlin & Co: How stagnation, and what that means for all brand new album, Funny Little World. Full of the Abbott Government destroyed itself. of us. Join author and financial expert haunting melodies and frolicking beats, the Monday 15 February, 6.30pm Satyajit Das to hear him talk on this topic, new album reveals Platt’s fascination with AN EVENING WITH Readings Carlton and discuss potential real world solutions. sophisticated 1960s European pop music. 29 ALEXANDER

Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events Free, no booking required McCALL SMITH Join Sue Pennicuik, Greens MLC for the Thursday 11 February, 6.30pm Thursday 18 February, 6.30pm Join one of the world’s most beloved authors, Southern Metropolitan region, for the launch of the illustrated history of the Ripponlea area, Readings Carlton Readings St Kilda Alexander McCall Smith, for a beguiling The Village of Ripponlea by Judith Buckrich. hour of love stories. McCall Smith is a Monday 15 February, 6.30pm prolific, award-winning author and his books THE READINGS YA ANNA CLARK IN Readings St Kilda include the internationally bestselling and 17 BOOK CLUB 23 CONVERSATION delightful Number One Ladies’ Detective The Readings YA Book Club is an informal WITH CLARE Agency series. His most recent book is Join us as renowned musician Hugo Race monthly gathering for enthusiasts of all WRIGHT Chance Developments, which brings together shares his evocations of Melbourne, Europe ages to discuss YA literature with a focus love stories from across the globe inspired by and the USA, Berlin and Eastern Europe, Italy, Private Lives, Public Histories explores how we on Australian authors, hosted by St Kilda chanced-upon old photographs. Brazil, Mali and Africa from his first book, reconcile the public debates over Australian Childrens’ Specialist Isobel Moore. We begin Road Series. history with our own personal narratives and Tickets are $40 and include a signed copy of with Lady Helen and the Dark Days Club by Wednesday 24 February, 6.30pm familial understandings of history. Drawing either Chance Developments or The Woman Who Alison Goodman. On the eve of eighteen- Readings Carlton on interviews with Australians from five Walked in Sunshine. Please book at year-old Lady Helen Wrexhall’s presentation communities around the country, Clark readings.com.au/events to the Queen, one of her family’s housemaids uncovers how we think about the past and the Monday 29 February, 6.30pm Discover Olga Lorenzo’s superb writing at disappears, and Helen is drawn into the role history plays in our lives. She will be in Church of All Nations, 180 Palmerston Street, the launch of her new novel about the best shadows of Regency London – Pride and discussion with historian Clare Wright. Carlton and worst aspects of family life, The Light on Prejudice meets Buffy in English high society. the Water. Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events Thursday 25 February, 6.30pm Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events Tuesday 23 February, 6.30pm Readings Carlton Wednesday 17 February, 7–8pm Readings Carlton Readings St Kilda Coming up in March Join us for the launch of The Cinema of Sean PAUL STRANGIO & STAN GRANT ON Penn: In and Out of Place. Although best BARRY JONES IN known as an Academy Award winning actor, 17 CONVERSATION 23 JAMES WALTER IN 7 HIS NEW BOOK, March Sean Penn’s directorial works offer some of WITH MARK RUBBO CONVERSATION TALKING TO MY the most interesting and singular films made WITH GEORGE in the USA over the past twenty years. Barry Jones shares his love of the great COUNTRY Thursday 25 February, 6pm literature and music of the world in MEGALOGENIS We are delighted to have award winning Readings St Kilda conversation with Readings’ Mark Rubbo. In Paul Strangio, Paul ’t Hart and James Walter’s journalist Stan Grant talking about his a long and generously lived life, Barry Jones Settling the Office explores the development new book, Talking To My Country. This has been on an endless quest to share the of the Australian prime ministership from its is that rare and special book that speaks Celebrate the launch of the latest Griffith extraordinary and the beautiful, to encourage rudimentary early days following Federation to every Australian about their country Review: Fixing the System, which asks the pursuit of an abundant life of reading through to the powerful, institutionalised – what it is, and what it could be. Join us why Australia failed to live up to its early and listening. His new book The Shock of prime-ministerial leadership of the postwar era. for a discussion of Grant’s extraordinarily promise as a global leader with an innovative, Recognition is a funny, deeply considered and Join Paul Strangio, James Walker and George powerful and personal meditation on race, egalitarian social democracy. richly rewarding journey of the mind. Megalogenis for a discussion about leadership. culture and national identity. Monday 29 February, 6.30pm Readings Hawthorn Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events. Wednesday 17 February, 6.30pm Tuesday 23 February, 6.30pm Monday 7 March, 6.30pm Readings Hawthorn Readings Hawthorn Readings Carlton 6 READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 The most anticipated books of 2016 Alison Huber, Head Book Buyer

Dear Reader, I am troubled. It seems like only moments ago that we were looking back at the year that was 2015, checking our reading diaries, assembling our list of the books that were the best of the year, and comparing our assessment of writing achievements to that of others. And now I find myself needing to forget all about last year, turn my attention in the opposite direction, and produce instead a new list: this time a register of books to anticipate. From living in the reading past I must now focus on living in the reading future; but what, dear reader, becomes of the reading present? Please forgive this digression … February’s new releases already give a hint of the rich year we have ahead of us in 2016. Fiona McFarlane’s 2013 debut novel, The Night Guest, was shortlisted for both the Miles Clockwise from top left: The Shock of Franklin Literary Award and the Stella Prize as well as our inaugural Readings Prize. Her Recognition by Barry Jones (February, A&U); follow-up book is a wonderful new collection of short stories, The High Places, and it’s our The Hate Race by Maxine Beneba Clarke book of the month. This work joins that of a number of other early career Australian writers, (August, Hachette); The Midnight Watch including Dominique Wilson with her second novel, That Devil’s Madness, and a debut-short by David Dyer (March, Hamish Hamilton); story collection from Michelle Michau-Crawford, Leaving Elvis, while former ALP Member for Shylock Is My Name by Howard Jacobson Melbourne, Lindsay Tanner, turns his talents to fiction with Comfort Zone. Howard Jacobson (February, Hogarth); and Our Magic Hour by contributes the second instalment of Hogarth’s series of novels that rework Shakespeare’s plays, Jennifer Down (March, Text). with Shylock is My Name, using The Merchant of Venice as inspiration. Two other previous winners of the Man Booker Prize, Julian Barnes and Yann Martel, also have new novels this month (The Noise of Time and The High Mountains of Portugal respectively). I’m very keen to The Hate Race. I’m fascinated by the idea of Thornton McCamish’s passion project to be read Larissa Behrendt’s Finding Eliza: Power and Colonial Storytelling, an exploration of the published by Black Inc. in April: an excavation of the life and importance of a famed but impact of colonial literature’s representations of Indigenous peoples. Terri-Ann White has forgotten figure in Our Man Elsewhere: In Search of Alan Moorhead. Musician, writer and edited a book that records the results of some fascinating-sounding workshops held between national treasure Robert Forster is working on a book called Grant & I for Penguin, due later writers and people living in remote communities in Desert Writing: Stories from Country. in the year. My predecessor Martin Shaw was an early champion of Steven Amsterdam’s Meanwhile, everyone’s favourite public intellectual, Barry Jones, reflects on the works of incredible 2009 debut, Things We Didn’t See Coming; Amsterdam’s third novel is out this literature and music that have carried him on his life’s journey in The Shock of Recognition. The year with Hachette and I can’t wait to read it. New work from Helen Garner is always an demise of the Abbott government will continue to intrigue for years to come, with the gaze this event in which to rejoice: she publishes a collection of essays, Everywhere I Look, in April. time turning to the former PM’s relationship with advisor Peta Credlin. Black Inc. publishes Scribe brings us two excellent Berlin-themed books, both translated into English from the Aaron Patrick’s assessment, Credlin & Co: How the Abbott Government Destroyed Itself this original German for the first time: Hans Fallada’s The Nightmare (June) and Franz Hessel’s month and then Scribe brings us Niki Savva’s analysis in March, The Road to Ruin: How Tony Walking in Berlin: A Flaneur in the Capital (July), as well as a fantastic-sounding memoir from Abbott and Peta Credlin Destroyed Their Own Government. I must further recommend a couple Kim Mahood, Position Doubtful: Mapping Landscapes and Memories in August. Journalist of books that have been in store since January: Sunil Yapa’s Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of Clementine Ford publishes her debut, Fight Like a Girl, a book that unpicks the negative a Fist is an accomplished debut set during the protests at the 1999 WTO meetings in Seattle; connotations of that phrase (and others intended to demean women) with a memoir/call to and Chris Kraus’s 1997 feminist masterpiece and cult classic/memoir-fiction-theory mash- arms. MUP has a collection of essays from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander thinkers on up, I Love Dick, is finding a new audience with a republication by Tuskar Rock Press. And a constitutional reform, It’s Our Country Too (eds Megan Davis and Marcia Langton) in April, hearty congratulations to one of the many multi-talented Readings staff, Leanne Hall, on the and the same month philosopher Damon Young turns his attention to the act in which you publication of her new book for kids, Iris and the Tiger! are now engaging with The Art of Reading. Elena Ferrante’s many devotees will swoon at the So much for February … There’s also the rest of the year to think about, so hold onto your thought of Frantumaglia: On Writing and Reading, a collection of her non-fiction writing due hats for this whirlwind (and absolutely, terrifyingly incomplete) run-down of what’s ahead in in May from Text. Text is also publishing a recently discovered manuscript from the author 2016. March is already clearly in view for us book buyers, with some major titles hitting our of Wake in Fright, Kenneth Cook (called Fear is the Rider), as well a local edition of buzz book shelves next month, including David Dyer’s highly anticipated debut, The Midnight Watch, a The Argonauts (by Maggie Nelson) in April, and work from the 2015 Nobel Prize winner, novel which will have us all talking about the fortunes of Titanic again (and again, and again); Svetlana Alexievich, in June. I love the title of Aden Rolfe’s forthcoming poetry collection he joins some other notable Australian fiction releases including books from Kirsten Tranter, through Giramondo, False Nostalgia. UQP will be publishing a debut book of poems by 2015 Olga Lorenzo, Josephine Rowe, Jennifer Down, Sarah Kanake and Robyn Mundy. Stan Readings Prize shortlister Ellen van Neerven called Comfort Food in June. And looking well Grant’s Talking to My Country builds on his piece published in the Guardian last year, and is ahead, Readings’ own A.S. Patric has a new novel through Transit Lounge in November, set to be essential reading. The appearance of the fifth book in Karl Ove Knausgaard’s ‘My Atlantic Black, following his acclaimed novel from last year, Black Rock White City. Struggle’ epic, Some Rain Might Fall, will please his many fans. I suggest you keep a lookout And now I’m really running out of room so list form must kick in to whet your appetite for Work Like Any Other, a powerful debut from a graduate of the famed Michener Center even further … Expect books from: Georgia Blain; Arnold Zable; Inga Simpson; Henry for Writers, Virginia Reeves, set in the age of electrification in Alabama. Throw in a Quarterly Reyonlds; Jacinta Halloran; Patrick Holland; Emily Maguire; Toni Jordan; David Brooks; Essay from George Megalogenis, a fortieth anniversary edition of Anne Summers’ classic, AND: Don DeLillo (Zero K due in May!); Curtis Sittenfeld (does Pride and Prejudice in Damned Whores and God’s Police, an Italian-English bilingual memoir from Jhumpa Lahiri, Eligible!); Lionel Shriver; Annie Proulx; Julie Myerson; Jesse Ball; Jonathan Safran Foer; and a saucy crime debut from the UK with a publishing story to end all publishing stories Chris Cleave; Aravind Adiga; Tracy Chevalier; Simon Sebag Montefiore (on the Romanovs!); (L.S. Hilton’s Maestra), and you’ll see it’s set to be a monster March. Elizabeth Strout; Alain de Botton (returns to writing fiction!); Zadie Smith; Marie I could go month to month from here on out, but I’m afraid my editor has given me strict Darrieussecq; Muriel Barber; Nicola Barker; Justin Cronin (finishes his vampire trilogy with instructions about word length, so I will have to be brief. Indeed, I’m going to need to resort The City of Mirrors!); and what will come of the rumours of a new Cormac McCarthy …? to list format at some point so please bear with me. Jane Harper won the Victorian Premier’s Truly, this is nowhere near the end of the list, but it’s all that will fit. Award for an Unpublished Manuscript, and the resulting book, The Dry, will be published in But while it is a treat to reflect on what has been read, and a thrill to anticipate reading June. Hannah Kent follows up her monumentally successful Burial Rites with a new novel that is yet to come, please, dear reader, don’t forget about your reading present: the most in the second half of the year. We here at Readings also loved Maxine Beneba Clarke’s debut, important book at any time is the one you are reading right now … Foreign Soil, and she follows that stunning short-story collection in August with a memoir, READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 7

New Fiction LEAVING ELVIS culture and the many trappings of middle- Michelle Michau-Crawford class life. She worries often about how she might live her life differently and feels a UWAP. PB. $24.99 Book of the Month sense of disconnection from the capitalist A man returns from machine. Unsurprisingly, she is also World War II and fascinated by her namesake’s life and work. THE HIGH PLACES struggles to deal with We meet Veblen as she embarks on a Fiona McFarlane what’s happened in his relationship with Paul, a talented medical absence. Almost 70 years Penguin. PB. Was $32.99 researcher who has invented a device that later, his middle-aged 29.99 he hopes will help increase the chance of granddaughter, packing survival for soldiers who suffer brain When asked ‘What do you think makes a good story?’ Fiona up her late injuries in the field. McFarlane replied, ‘The best stories take a leap into another grandmother’s home, So far, so serious, but this book is life, and threaten to strand us there.’ After reading McFarlane’s discovers more than she had bargained for. actually an unexpected breath of fresh collection of short stories I admit I was more than happily stranded Thirteen closely linked stories of one family air – a funny, witty novel that offered this in most of them. The diversity of themes, timelines and characters and the rippling of consequences across reader a welcome change of pace after a made every story refreshing, and McFarlane’s writing is three generations play out against the year of sombre (albeit wonderful) reading accomplished. For readers who spurn the modern short story because they feel nothing backdrop of a changing Australia. A debut in 2015. That said, this is no featherweight happens in them, these are meaty stories, loaded with plot. collection as powerful as it is tender, from read, since author Elizabeth McKenzie the winner of the 2013 ABR Elizabeth explores a range of serious topics including Jolley Short Story Prize. ‘For readers who spurn the modern short story because medical ethics, intellectual property, translation, commodification, the military- THAT DEVIL’S MADNESS they feel nothing happens in them, these are meaty stories, industrial-complex, mental health and Dominique Wilson family dynamics, but edifies the reader on loaded with plot.’ Transit Lounge. PB. $29.95 these matters by stealth rather than with a An Australian heavy hand. Along the way, we also manage McFarlane’s debut novel, The Night Guest, stunned readers and critics alike and was photojournalist travels to to learn quite a lot about Thorstein Veblen, shortlisted for the 2014 Miles Franklin Award. This collection of thirteen stories will have Algeria to follow in her and I must admit to wanting to dust off my general appeal. In my favourite story, ‘Rose Bay’, a woman named Rose is visited by her grandfather’s footsteps, old copy of his 1899 work, The Theory of the sister Susan, young niece and nephew. It’s after World War II, and Susan will be travelling and make her mark. But Leisure Class, to reacquaint myself with his to California to visit her in-laws following her husband’s death. McFarlane weaves in some will the bonds that once writing which is, at times and in spite of its subtle revelations about Rose’s love life, and in combination with the grieving family and existed be sufficient for own seriousness, quite witty. the niece’s imaginary friend, there is a dramatic climax at Taronga Zoo. her to survive? That Oh, and did I mention that squirrels Many stories contain the theme of human and animal connection and inter-reliance. Devil’s Madness tells of might talk in this book? I have no space left A vet has a car accident on her wedding day whilst travelling to treat a sick cat. A the often heart-rending tensions that exist to explain, but don’t worry, it works, and it scientist researching a giant squid becomes affected by malaria, and obsesses over a plan between idealism and duty, between works really well. A truly original, delightful to free the squid. Familial relationships are also explored in all their guises. In the title friendship and loyalty to one’s country – of and very entertaining book. story, ‘The High Places’, a farmer worn down by years of drought doesn’t know whether the struggle for freedom, dignity and Alison Huber is the head book buyer for to believe that his bible-quoting son can bring rain, or whether the boy is crazy. The respect. Dramatic, honest and shockingly Readings farmer decides to take a chance on a road trip with his son to a ‘high place’ where the son relevant to our times, the novel is driven by believes they must sacrifice some of their sheep. They drive for hours, hot and feverish finely crafted characters, exquisite prose JONATHAN UNLEASHED when they run out of water, and after the sacrifice, each asks for what they desire most, and razor-sharp drama and mystery. Meg Rosoff surprising each other. Bloomsbury. PB. $27.99 Annie Condon is from Readings Hawthorn Australian Fantasy Jonathan has a perfect girlfriend, a decent apartment in Fear is the Rider is a schlocky, old-school KINGS RISING Australian Fiction New York, and a (soul thriller in the best possible way – Cook’s C.S. Pacat sucking) job that pays writing is bare-bones and no-nonsense, Penguin. PB. $22.99 the rent. Nonetheless, he FEAR IS THE RIDER light on metaphor and linguistic flourish, feels like he is at a reflecting a harsh and brutal landscape that In the Captive Prince Kenneth Cook trilogy’s final thrilling standstill, ready and is just as deadly to Katie and Shaw as the waiting to fall into Text. PB. $19.99 instalment, Damen’s creature hunting them. Watching Shaw and ‘adulthood’. While patiently anticipating Kenneth Cook identity is now revealed, Katie grapple with their own incredulity this occurrence, he takes on the care of doesn’t beat around and he must face his and hubris as they try to outsmart the his brother’s two dogs. Sissy and Dante the bush – from the master Prince Laurent as relentless Man is an exquisite frustration. become his constant companions, there opening lines of Fear is the man he’d sworn to As a kind of literary Mad Max, a master with a sympathetic paw or soulful look, in the Rider, the reader is kill. On the brink of a class in Ozploitation, or simply as a short, addition to reading his mail, gallivanting thrust headlong into the momentous battle, the future of both their sharp burst of literary adrenaline, Fear is around New York unsupervised and the baking heat and choking countries hangs in the balance. Damen’s the Rider is a hell of a lot of fun. other fanciful things that Jonathan dust of the outback, and only hope of reclaiming his throne is to Alan Vaarwerk is the editorial assistant for suspects they do. This anthropomorphising into the terror and thrill fight together with Laurent against their Readings Monthly is recurrent, providing hilarious insight of survival. Written in the early 1980s but usurpers. But even if their fragile trust into the psyche of the dogs and their never before published, Fear is the Rider is survives, can it stand against the Regent’s COMFORT ZONE carer alike. When the opportunity to a posthumous thrill-ride from the master of final, deadly play for the throne? Lindsay Tanner achieve adulthood appears, Jonathan the Ozploitation genre, most famous for the Scribe. PB. $29.99 leaps; but is it towards success or cult classic Wake in Fright. imminent doom? In true thriller fashion, the Jack van Duyn is in International Fiction A long-time fan of Meg Rosoff’s protagonists’ backstories are largely his comfort zone. A young adult works, I received her perfunctory, and dispensed with quickly; pot-bellied cabbie in THE PORTABLE VEBLEN first adult book with anticipation. budding architect John Shaw, driving from his mid-fifties, he Elizabeth McKenzie The chick lit-y title and frequent dog- Sydney to Adelaide in a small hatchback, lives on his own and HarperCollins. PB. $29.99 related puns in the blurb didn’t exactly meets freelance journalist Katie Alton in has lots of opinions enthral me immediately, and seemed a tiny outback pub. The next day, as he about those who get You may not like quite a divergence from her YA explores a remote desert track, he sees more than they immediately material. Plus, Jonathan is unusual to Katie, running out towards him, chased by deserve. After recognise the name of the say the least. However, I found myself a strange and terrible creature. So begins reluctantly breaking economist, sociologist devouring the second half of the book a tense and desperate game of cat-and- up a fight between a group of Somali and critic of modernity, at a café, frequently snorting aloud mouse as the terrified travellers try to children, Jack is transfixed by the Thorstein Veblen, but with a complete disregard for elegance outrun and outsmart the Man, who has beautiful mother of one of them. What you will recognise some and my public location. Jonathan’s odd Katie’s axe and her LandCruiser, and will follows is a hair-raising descent into a of the concepts that he narration is jarring to read at first, but destroy all in his way – locals and tourists, world of drugs, ASIO harassment, introduced into the this distance easily morphs into affection black and white alike – in his deranged criminal thuggery and payback – an twentieth century as his weirdness becomes more and more pursuit of Katie and Shaw. astute novel about inner-city Australian lexicon, perhaps most notably the notion of pronounced. He reminded me a little of Transplanting the medieval myth of racism and humanity emerging in the ‘conspicuous consumption’. Veblen Christopher from The Curious Incident of the ‘Wild Man’ into an outback that is itself face of reality. Amundsen-Hovda was named after the the Dog in the Nighttime, and also of Don mythologised in the Australian imagination, sociologist by her mother and, like Thorstein himself, Veblen is troubled by consumer Tilman of Graham Simsion’s Rosie books; 8 READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016

none of these characters quite belong Again, we see a man taking stock of The strength of this work is not just in the world in which they inhabit, and his life: in this case, the Soviet composer the compelling story it tells but that it is each is each increasingly puzzled by this Dmitri Shostakovich, whose career founded in real-life events. Ultimately, fact. Jonathan Unleashed is immensely came under the watchful eye of Stalin’s it’s an inspiring story about how hope satisfying in its resolution, and both fans dictatorship, and, to a lesser but lingering and love can fortify one’s resolve even of Rosoff’s work and new readers will be degree, that of Krushchev. when the struggle for survival is acute. held captive by her inimitable writing The book begins with Shostakovich A film adaptation of the book, style and strange yet relatable characters. anxiously smoking cigarette after cigarette released in Hungary in late December, Jo Boyce is from Readings Carlton in the foyer of his apartment, convinced will feature in international film festivals that Soviet agents are shortly to come throughout 2016. WHEN THE FLOODS and take him away to the Big House. His Natalie Platten is from Readings Malvern CAME crime? Composing an opera which had received a bad review in the state-owned Clare Morrall ALL THAT IS LOST Pravda newspaper –a sign that Stalin BETWEEN US H&S. PB. Available 9 Feb. $29.99 wasn’t happy. Sara Foster Set in a future Throughout the book big questions imagining of are asked, such as, ‘Who does art belong S&S. PB. $29.99 Britain that is scarily to?’ Does it belong to the masses, or All That is Lost believable, the latest the privileged, educated few? How is a Between Us is at novel from Man Booker composer expected to maintain a creative once a psychological Prize-shortlisted author output, if he is required to toe the party thriller and a portrait Clare Morrall is a line musically? And also, importantly of a family at breaking literary thriller that for Shostakovich, is it more important to point. At 17 years old, forces readers to stand up for your integrity and die for your it’s natural that consider questions of principles, or to live to compose another Georgia keeps secrets family and survival. symphony, albeit within the dictates of from her parents, yet Twenty years ago, a deadly virus spread Soviet parameters? one secret in across Britain, decimating the population It was fascinating to read about the particular is weighing her down more and rendering many of the survivors impact of Stalin’s dictatorship on the arts; heavily than the rest. A harrowing hit and infertile. The Polanski family are lucky. the speeches written by party officials run incident that leaves Georgia’s cousin They all have a natural immunity which that Shostakovich was expected to read Sophia in a critical condition kick-starts means they can reproduce, though as our out when he travelled overseas; and the this tightly woven novel. Was this an 22-year-old narrator Roza explains, it can conundrum of wanting to stand up and tell accident, or was somebody targeting these be hard to appreciate that luck ‘in the face the truth, but knowing that the price you girls? Georgia is left traumatised, her of the encroaching dust, in the endless, would pay for truth-telling was blood. brother, Zac, is in shock and her parents’ unpopulated space’. Out of a desire for I fully expect to see this book on all the added anxieties aren’t helping them deal independence, Roza’s parents have kept short-lists over the coming year. And don’t with their marital crisis. their family separated from Brighton let its size fool you – it’s big and meaty, Reading this novel, the fourth from UK- where a central hub of survivors exists. even though it’s more novella-sized than born, Perth-based author Sara Foster, is Though digital communication is a staple full-length book. an exercise in piecing together the hidden in their lives, Roza and her siblings have clues the Turner family are holding close Gabrielle Williams is from Readings Malvern never actually met others their age in to their chests. Each chapter offers a new person. Children, we soon learn, are a rare FEVER AT DAWN perspective, with alternating narrators – commodity. When a stranger appears in Georgia, Zac and their father, Callum (all Péter Gárdos the Polanski’s home he brutally shakes told in the third-person), as well as their the foundations of their lives and their Text. PB. $29.99 mother Anya, whose chapters are written sheltered existence. Fever at Dawn is in the first-person, lending them a unique With When the Floods Came, Morrall a debut novel by weight. This vignette-style works well; joins a growing list of authors who are film director Péter tensions are explored in a complex and treating climate change as urgent and Gárdos. Based on the nuanced way, offering varied insights into fecund ground for fiction – consider the personal letters of the myriad issues that threaten to divide recent publications of James Bradley’s correspondence a family when communication starts to Clade and Mireille Juchau’s The World between his parents, break down. Without Us. The world Morrall depicts it recounts their Tension in the novel is intensified by is rich and layered, and presents remarkable story of the tight timeline of events. Only spanning interesting possibilities for how the emancipation as 48 hours, and set against the evocative balance between nature and machinery Holocaust survivors. This sensitive work backdrop of England’s Lake District, may evolve with time. The characters reads like a eulogy written by a son to the novel starts slowly, and momentum rely on advanced technology for their his deceased father and is in itself an act quickly builds. The setting here is central daily life, even though it is clear that a of homage. to the plot – Georgia is a championship time is coming when they won’t be able We meet Péter’s parents, Miklós fell runner, and her father Callum is to replace necessary parts. The land is and Lili, when they are convalescing in part of the mountain rescue volunteer prone to violent flooding, and the impact separate refugee camps in Sweden not team. Foster has a gift for writing about of extreme weather conditions is a stark long after their rescue from the German landscape and the way it shapes the lives reality across the world. Roza frequently death camps. Both struggle to nourish of local inhabitants. She’s also skilled at philosophises on how she may choose their emaciated bodies back to health, incorporating the role technology plays in to live going forward. As a child she but for Miklós the prognosis is dire. schoolyard politics. This only heightens knows she is the future, and it is not a Tuberculosis has caused irreparable the immediacy of the drama, widening the responsibility she takes lightly. damage to his lungs and he is given only appeal to teenage as well as adult readers. months to live. Much to his doctor’s Bronte Coates is the digital content All That is Lost Between Us is a coordinator for Readings bewilderment, Miklós refutes the suspenseful, skilfully constructed novel medical certainty of his imminent death that kept me awake long into the night, THE NOISE OF TIME and sets a plan of action in motion to begging to be read in one sitting. find a wife. It is not denial that is at Julian Barnes Stella Charls is the marketing and events work here, rather, as the words of Viktor Jonathan Cape. HB. Was $32.99 coordinator for Readings Frankl explain, ‘the salvation of man is 27.99 through love and in love’ and this is the PAULINA & FRAN What a delight it salve that Miklós seeks. Rachel B. Glaser has been to spend Motivated by a powerful sense of time with Julian Barnes self-determination, Miklós sends out 117 Granta. PB. Available 1 Feb. $27.99 and his new novel, The handwritten letters to young Hungarian Sharp-tongued, fearsome Noise of Time. Elegantly women living in refugee camps scattered Paulina meets lovely, written and perfectly throughout Sweden. Out of all the return listless Fran one night at a balanced, this slight book letters he receives he knows immediately house-party held near (it comes in at under 200 which woman he is going to marry. their privileged New pages) is Barnes’ first What follows is a developing love story England art school. novel since his Booker Prize-winning, The that thwarts barriers and forces fate to Together they drift Sense of an Ending. rewrite itself. through their classes, READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 9 critique their fellow students, lavish Victor and his father are heading for a singled out for a divine calling of her attention on their curls and nurture their collision too. own. As rumours of war grow more shared dreams of genius. But when their insistent, Etta’s quest takes on a new burgeoning friendship tips from intensity THE GREEN ROAD urgency – and the lines between fantasy into enmity our two heroines find Anne Enright and reality become dangerously blurred. themselves cast out from the halcyon days Vintage. PB. $22.99 A story of a child far from home and of art school, divided from one another caught between two cultures, In a Land of Hanna, Dan, and set adrift in the increasingly Paper Gods marks the arrival of a striking Constance and Emmet disappointing world of adulthood. A new voice. return to the west beguiling story of friendship and prickly, coast of Ireland for a ever-elusive love; for readers of Miranda final family Christmas AMERICAN HOUSEWIFE July, Sheila Heti and Tao Lin. in the home their Helen Ellis mother is about to Scribner. HB. $35 SHYLOCK IS MY NAME sell. As the feast turns Meet the women of Howard Jacobson to near painful American Housewife: Hogarth. PB. $29.99 comedy, a last, they smoke their eyes Wealthy philanthropist desperate act from Rosaleen – a woman and paint their lips. Simon Strulovitch who doesn’t quite know how to love her They channel Beyoncé needs someone to talk children – forces them to confront the while doing household to – so when he meets weight of family ties and the road that chores. They drown Shylock at a Cheshire brought them home. The Green Road was their sorrows with cemetery, it’s the awarded the 2015 Irish Novel of the Year, Chanel No. 5 and host beginning of a and shortlisted for the 2015 Costa novel book clubs where remarkable friendship. prize. chardonnay trumps Meanwhile, the rich, Charles Dickens. And they are quietly manipulative socialite THE HIGH MOUNTAINS capable of kidnapping, breaking and Plurabelle and her loyal friend D’Anton’s OF PORTUGAL entering, and murder. Vicious, fresh and attempts to play Cupid with Strulovitch’s Yann Martel darkly hilarious, American Housewife is a daughter put a pound of flesh on the line. collection of stories for anyone who has Text. PB. $29.99 Howard Jacobson’s version of The ever wondered what really goes on behind In the early 1900s, Merchant of Venice bends time to its own the façades of Middle America. Tomás discovers an advantage, asking what it means to be a ancient journal, and father, a Jew and a merciful human being I LOVE DICK sets out from Lisbon in in the modern world. Chris Kraus search of the strange Tuskar Rock. PB. $27.99 WELCOME TO treasure it describes. Thirty-five years later, Blurring the lines of BRAGGSVILLE a pathologist, whose fiction, essay and T. Geronimo Johnson wife has possibly been memoir, Chris Kraus’s HarperCollins. PB. $19.99 murdered, finds novel was a literary Born and raised in the himself drawn into Tomás’s quest. Fifty sensation when it was heart of old Dixie, years later, a Canadian politician, grieving first published in 1997. D’aron Davenport is a the death of his own wife, rescues a When Chris spends an small-town fish chimpanzee and takes it to Portugal, evening with a rogue floundering in the where the three stories miraculously academic named Dick, depths of the large, intersect. Witty and engaging, Yann she falls madly and hyper-liberal pond of Martel’s new novel is a suspenseful, inexplicably in love, enlisting her UC Berkeley. mesmerising quest for meaning. husband in her haunted pursuit and Everything changes in transforming an adolescent infatuation his American History THE INTERPRETER into a new form of philosophy. Widely class, when D’aron lets slip that his Diego Marani considered to be the most important feminist novel of the past two decades, I hometown hosts an annual Civil War Text. PB. $29.99 re-enactment. His announcement is met Love Dick remains essential reading. After the acclaimed with righteous indignation, and inspires a New Finnish Grammar ‘performative intervention’. Armed with SINGLE CAREFREE and The Last of the youthful self-importance, makeshift slave MELLOW Vostyachs, The costumes, righteous zeal and their own Interpreter is the third Katherine Heiny misguided ideas about the South, D’aron in this thrilling trilogy. HarperCollins. PB. $17.99 and his three idiosyncratic best friends Günther Stauber, head In the title story, we descend on Braggsville. Their journey is of translation and meet Maya, who is torn uproarious to begin with, but will have interpreting at a major between her wryly devastating consequences. international funny boyfriend and organisation in Geneva, seems to have a the allure of her YOUR HEART IS A mysterious illness when his translations veterinarian. In MUSCLE THE SIZE OF become unintelligible. He insists that he is ‘Andorra’, a woman’s A FIST on the verge of discovering the primordial lover calls her every Sunil Yapa universal language. His boss, Felix Thursday as he drives Little Brown. PB. $29.99 Bellamy, decides Günther has to go. But to meet his wife at Set during the World then Felix starts speaking the same marriage counselling. Revisiting Maya in Trade Organization gibberish, and, after seeking help in a several stories, chronicling her various protests in 1999, this is sanatorium, he realises that Günther is the states of love, this is a collection about a deeply charged novel only one who can help him. how we are unfaithful to each other, both showcasing a distinct wilfully and unwittingly. Populated with new literary voice. IN A LAND OF PAPER unwelcome house guests, disastrous Victor, homeless after GODS birthday parties, needy but loyal friends, a family tragedy, finds Rebecca Mackenzie and flirtatious older men, the stories are emotionally astute, and disarming, himself pounding the Headline. PB. $29.99 streets of Seattle with introducing us to a tart, and marvellous, Jiangxi Province, new voice. little meaning or purpose. He is the China, 1941: In a estranged son of the police chief of the city, mountaintop boarding and today his father is in charge of one of school for the the largest protests in the history of children of British Western democracy. In a matter of hours missionaries, ten- hordes of protesters – from all sections of year-old Henrietta society – will test the patience of the city’s Robertson discovers police force, and lives will be altered that she has been forever. In the midst of this nightmare, 10 READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016

New Crime Dead Write with Fiona Hardy Crime Book of the Month RAIN DOGS GIRL WAITS WITH GUN Adrian McKinty Amy Stewart THE POISON ARTIST Serpent’s Tail. PB. $29.99 Scribe. PB. $32.99 Jonathan Moore The fifth book in the Sean By now, dear readers, you Duffy trilogy proves yet can probably imagine my Orion. PB. $29.99 again that we should be impatient face when I’m In a San Franciscan hotel, Caleb Maddox cleans the cut on grateful that McKinty presented with another his forehead. His girlfriend threw a crystal tumbler at his went into literature and book with ‘Girl’ in the head, and it didn’t miss. It’s all he can do to fix himself up and not maths. I’ve yet to meet title, especially when (like then go and find solace from what happened – what she did, and a reader who wasn’t always) said ‘Girl’ is in what he did that made her do it. So he leaves to find a bar and thrilled by Duffy’s fact a Woman. Or, perhaps lose himself in something, maybe whiskey, maybe everything. But company – he’s the kind more appropriate for the then she comes through the door, in a black dress that swims of down-on-his-luck but quick-on-the- time period here, a Lady: Miss Constance against her skin, drinking absinthe with a cube of sugar. He uptake character you love to spend time Kopp, oldest of three sisters, recently doesn’t know her name, or anything about her. But he knows this: that he needs to find with, always losing girlfriends for various shaken by the death of her mother and, her again. What he doesn’t know is that he shouldn’t. reasons and colleagues to the general more recently, physically shaken by a danger that is Northern Ireland during the brazen buggy accident whereupon the ‘The Poison Artist is seductive, haunting, and intimate; Troubles. Here, Duffy is again embroiled in other driver was at fault. Constance, literature as intoxicating as rare spirits, and as unnerving a second locked-room mystery – except the despite her sisters’ entreaties, turns up at room is Carrickfergus Castle and the the driver’s factory doorstep to claim their as the spiked tip of a needle.’ mystery is the death of a journalist, found expenses and instead is met with a war: silk at the bottom of a wall. Each of these merchant gang vs. sisters who will not This book is such an eloquent, delicately macabre mystery right from the start. Tom-Waits-song-titled books are a stand for such nonsense. Based on the true We know so little of Caleb, even as we follow him and his head injury from bar to bar, satisfying treat of taut and witty writing, story of how a tall farm girl became one of from bottle to glass, and from unconsciousness on his couch to the sharp realities of dialogue, and characters. Bring your the United States’ first female deputy his work. As a renowned toxicologist, currently researching how the story of a person’s umbrella and dive in. sheriffs, this is a delight: humorous, physical pain is told in their blood, he is famous, hunted for his knowledge, but close thrilling, and strung with danger. to losing financing. And when a colleague asks for his advice on a dead body, it seems THE VICTIM WITHOUT he is not the only one fascinated by how much people can suffer. The Poison Artist A FACE THE METHOD is seductive, haunting, and intimate; literature as intoxicating as rare spirits and as Shannon Kirk unnerving as the spiked tip of a needle. Stefan Ahnhem Head of Zeus. PB. Available 1 Feb. $29.99 Sphere. PB. $29.99 Obviously, a new year of Lisa is 16 years old and Dead Write can’t possibly pregnant when she is start without a abducted and thrown Scandinavian thriller, and into a van, taken to a this has a great hook. house, and kept there Fabian Risk has uprooted with one ultimate goal: his family from that her child, when Stockholm to take up a born, will be taken from position in his hometown her. So far so grim, but of Helsingborg and avoid the fallout from a with one problem the baby farmers didn’t previous case. He has six weeks of leave allow for: Lisa is less what I was at 16 before taking up the position but, as we (into perms and Mariah Carey) and more FLOWERS & TAOC calculating genius. She takes in know, no literary police officer ever actually gets a holiday. After the gruesome everything in her cell and methodically discovery of a dehanded man’s body lists each item until she can develop a ARE SOOO THIS YEAR way – Method 15/33 – to escape from her alongside a defaced class picture, Risk’s new boss calls him in – after all, he’s in the captors. While Lisa has the ability to cut picture too. All too soon, more of his off her emotions when she needs to, classmates are found murdered in readers won’t be doing any such thing – grotesquely inventive ways that tie into they’ll be too busy cheering or holding their schoolyard past, and Risk cannot leave their breath. the case alone, even when sent off it. An excellent, twisting debut. True Crime THE FALLING DETECTIVE Christoffer Carlsson EVIL LIFE: THE TRUE Scribe. PB. $32.99 STORY OF THE After last year’s excellent CALABRIAN MAFIA IN TALK The Invisible Man From AUSTRALIA Salem, police officer Leo Clive Small & Tom Gilling Junker has outwardly A&U. PB. Available 1 Feb. $32.99 LISTEN recovered from the murder case that saw Former Assistant DISCOVER him, despite being Commissioner of Police The Art of Couples’ Conversation suspended, tied so close Small and investigative that it almost killed him. journalist Gilling are brings couples of all ages and Now in homicide, paired up with the true-crime writers who stages closer together as they unlikely Gabriel Birck, who he’s barely have now turned their delight in communications that past loathing, winter has barely started pens to the story of when they are put on the case of a Australia’s connection enrich, enliven and strengthen sociology professor found killed in an with the Calabrian Mafia, one that the their relationship. The Art of Conversation is alley. His papers show that he wasn’t the authorities are keen to downplay. But available at Readings and all only person in danger, but before Junker from the northern cane fields in the early twentieth century to just about good book shops and Birck can figure it out the case is snatched away from them. But who in everywhere in Australia today, there’s a $19.95 RRP crime fiction ever lets a little history of the Calabrian underworld’s reassignment get in the way of solving an ties to this country that can’t be ignored. LAUGH LEARN CONNECT investigation? No one, that’s who – and Tracing the network of crime around the here’s another time we as readers are world and through dead bodies and hard www.taoc.com.au more than happy to follow our characters drugs, this book does all it can to unmask into trouble. a powerful threat. READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 11

New Young Adult Fiction See books for kids, junior and middle readers on pages 18–19

Young Adult Book of the Month

THE STARS AT OKTOBER BEND Glenda Millard A&U. PB. $19.99 I’m sad to admit it but I had never read Glenda Millard before The Stars at Oktober Bend and I can say I will be quickly rectifying this. Alice has been through a truly awful assault but luckily she has come out of it alive. However, the assault left her with acquired brain damage and she now has to deal with the aftermath. The people in her town call her names and make out that the assault was her fault, so Alice stops going to school and starts to withdraw into herself. But when Alice meets Manny, an ex-child soldier who has seen things that no child should ever see, she finally lets someone get close to her. Glenda Millard is a beautiful writer. Her stories are very visual and while often I’m not a huge fan of teens writing poetry in novels, Alice’s poetry is very touching. While sad, nce regarded as helpless victims The Stars at Oktober Bend is also uplifting as Alice and Manny’s developing relationship is Owaiting to be rescued, Muslim lovely to read about and brings hope. Ages 13 and up. women are now widely regarded Katherine Dretzke is from Readings Hawthorn by both Muslim and non-Muslim disciplinarians as a potential threat to be kept under control. How did MY SISTER ROSA are gripping, and so is their growing trust and this shift in attitudes come about? Justine Larbalestier friendship. Neither is an innocent, and both Shakira Hussein explores the lives are ensnared in a perilous situation where of women negotiating the hazards of A&U. PB. $19.99 one wrong step can result in death. the post-9/11 terrain, from volatile Rosa is ten Max is highly original and moving in its Afghan refugee camps and Pakistani years old. Rosa depiction of both the bravery and resilience weddings to Australian suburbia and is a psychopath. Her of children, and their ability to engage in campaigns to ‘ban the burqa’. Her older brother Che is acts of evil. Author Sarah Cohen-Scali has unique perspective on feminism, the only one that can written a unique, sensitive and morally multiculturalism, race and religion is see it, and is complex depiction of two lost and damaged one that we urgently need. therefore tasked boys. Little is held back in this book – and it with protecting the is for that reason that I’d recommend it for world from Rosa. teenagers 13 years and older. This novel is www.newsouthpublishing.com amazingly, Leanne Hall is from Readings Hawthorn stunningly well-written but not at all for the faint of heart. It’s suspenseful and BEAUTIFUL BROKEN thrilling and almost too perfectly tense to THINGS handle. I actually couldn’t handle it and Sara Barnard read the end before going back to my place Macmillan. PB. $16.99 which shows how stressed out Larbalestier When I was first made me! The characterisation is full and given Beautiful detailed, and the story is an interesting take Broken Things I was on nature versus nurture. expecting a story of Isobel Moore is from Readings St Kilda teenage debauchery, a bit of crazy fun. What MAX I was not expecting Sarah Cohen-Scali was a compelling Text. PB. $22.99 story about strong female friendship or Prepare to be the devastation that taken mental illness can wreak. uncomfortably deep Caddy can’t imagine a life without into the Third Reich. her best friend Rosie. Weekends are Our narrator, Konrad, always spent together, daily phone calls begins his story in are never missed and everyone knows utero – immediately that where Caddy goes Rosie goes too. demonstrating an That is, until Rosie meets Suzanne: a ambitious nature and beautiful, confident young woman whom unswerving devotion Caddy immediately sees as a threat to her to the Führer. Konrad has been conceived friendship with Rosie. But what Caddy as part of the little-known Nazi Lebensborn doesn’t know is that Suzanne has a broken program, a practical attempt at eugenics past – Suzanne doesn’t care about the that paired selected German women with consequences of her actions, and Caddy SS officers to produce thousands of finds that pretty exciting. As Suzanne ‘superior’ Aryan babies. leads Caddy into more and more trouble, Max is a fascinating and disturbing Rosie starts to step back. For the first time journey into the mind of a child raised by in their lives Rosie and Caddy’s friendship a regime; a child who is indoctrinated, may be about to be broken. traumatised, and denied all affection and Beautiful Broken Things is not just family. Konrad’s early care, schooling, and about mental illness, it’s about self the eventual chaotic collapse of the Reich confidence and the lack of it that is all make for harrowing reading. The Lebensborn too prevalent in teenage years. It’s also program extended to the kidnapping and about the ups and downs of young adult ‘Germanisation’ of blonde-haired, blue- friendships. I think it is important that eyed Polish children, and it is through his more YA books are tackling mental health fascination with Polish-Jewish boy, Lukas, and readers who enjoyed books such as that Konrad gradually faces the lies and Jennifer Niven’s All the Bright Places and misinformation of the Reich, and develops a Gayle Forman’s I Was Here should give this fledgling moral awareness. The physical and book a go. Ages 13 and up. Katherine political battles between Konrad and Lukas 12 READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016

New Nonfiction letters, diaries, and interviews with the choice to live in remote places participated people who knew him best. in workshops. This collection gathers new voices and perspectives on living in True Crime it is indeed a guidebook. It takes the A MOTHER’S RECKONING extreme geographical and climactic regions traveller (the reader) on a tour de force of Sue Klebold in today’s Australia. Jones’ favourite music and literature, and WH Allen. PB. Available 18 Feb. $35 A MURDER WITHOUT offers clues as to the source of his antipathy On April 20, 1999, Eric ECONOBABBLE MOTIVE towards what he calls the ‘shallowness Richard Denniss and toxicity’ of contemporary public life Harris and Dylan Klebold Martin McKenzie-Murray Black Inc. PB. $19.99 in Australia. As with all guidebooks, it is walked into Columbine Scribe. PB. $27.99 What is econobabble? We up to the reader to decide where he or she High School in Littleton, I’ve long been a hear it every day, when travels, but Jones exhorts the reader to Colorado. In minutes, they fan of Martin public figures and explorate another world, one that can be would kill 12 students and McKenzie-Murray’s commentators use found in great music and writing. a teacher and wound 24 journalism, and I think incomprehensible Though his choice of literature and others before taking their his work for The economic jargon to dress music is confined to that of the Western own lives. For the last Saturday Paper is up their self-interest as world, the depth of the author’s knowledge sixteen years, Sue Klebold, Dylan’s mother, outstanding. He is the national interest, to is astonishing. He is able to recommend a has lived with the indescribable grief and skilled at approaching make the absurd seem particular translation of a book or the best shame of that day. How could her child, the difficult topics with inevitable or the inequitable seem fair. recording of a musical work, be it an opera promising young man she had loved and sensitivity, compassion Econobabble is for those who, deep down, or a concerto. Who but a scholar would raised, be responsible for such horror? And and empathy. I am still haunted by the series have never believed that it makes sense, have read six versions of Dante’s Divine how, as his mother, had she not known he wrote in 2014 on the horrific, senseless economic or otherwise, to help poor people Comedy and be able to recommend the best? something was wrong? In A Mother’s murder of a baby in Bendigo. by slashing public spending on the services Jones summarises many of the works Reckoning, she chronicles with unflinching McKenzie-Murray’s debut book A they need. It’s also for those who have a he is passionate about and this will be of honesty her journey as a mother trying to Murder Without Motive: The Killing of sneaking suspicion that it would be cheaper value to those who need an introduction to come to terms with the incomprehensible. Rebecca Ryle builds on his journalistic to avoid the effects of climate change than to the writings of Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, work, and examines the tragic murder of let them happen and then ‘adapt’. Montaigne, Cervantes, Tolstoy, Proust QUICKSAND 19-year-old Rebecca Ryle in Perth in 2004. and many other authors. His musical Henning Mankell This particular death has long resonated tastes range from Ancient music through Harvill Secker. PB. $35 FINDING ELIZA with McKenzie-Murray because it the Baroque and the Classical periods to Larissa Behrendt happened in his local area, and his brother In January 2014 Contemporary works. Jones lists what he UQP. PB. $24.95 knew the man charged with Ryle’s murder. Henning Mankell was believes are the 60 greatest musical works, Aboriginal lawyer, writer McKenzie-Murray is a natural storyteller, informed that he had and even though the reader may disagree and filmmaker Larissa and this is evident in the way he lays out cancer. However, with his choices, they provide a good Behrendt has long been the facts of the case – he puts you right Quicksand is not a book starting point for exploration and critical fascinated by the story of there beside Ryle on the night she was about death and thought. Eliza Fraser, who was killed, following her and her murderer destruction, but about Despite its depth, this book is an easy purportedly captured by James Duggan through the moments that what it means to be and enjoyable read. The author’s style is the local Butchulla people eventually bring them together at Mindarie human, from the cave fluent, lucid, unpretentious and friendly after she was shipwrecked Primary School, the site of the crime. painters to the modern with dashes of wry humour. A reading must! on their island in 1836. In Following in the footsteps of Helen day. It’s a fascinating memoir-of-sorts from this deeply personal book, Behrendt Garner’s This House of Grief, McKenzie- Peter Gordon is a friend of Readings the legendary writer and campaigner for interrogates how Aboriginal people – and Murray deep dives into the case, and human rights. It’s about love and jealousy, indigenous people of other countries – have he spends significant time with Ryle’s CALL OF THE OUTBACK courage and fear, and about what it’s like to been portrayed in their colonisers’ stories. family. Some of the most heartbreaking, Marianne Van Velzen live with a potentially fatal illness. It is a book about how humanity has lived and continues Ultimately, Finding Eliza shows how stories and fascinating, parts of the book are A&U. PB. $32.99 as diverse as Robinson Crusoe and Coonardoo McKenzie-Murray’s interviews with Ryle’s to live, and about how Mankell has lived and After the birth of her not only reflect the values of their parents, as they reflect on their grief and will continue to live his life. illegitimate son, storytellers but also reinforce those values detail how they survived the ten years Ernestine Hill – and how, in Australia, this has contributed following their daughter’s death. abandoned her Australian Studies to a complex racial divide. A Murder Without Motive is thoughtful, comfortable urban life as careful and intimate in its approach. It digs a journalist for a THE POLITICS OF into issues of masculinity, violence and CREDLIN & CO. nomadic one. IDENTITY Australian culture, and McKenzie-Murray Throughout the 1930s Aaron Patrick Bronwyn Carlson examines the murderer’s possible motives Ernestine’s hugely Black Inc. PB. $29.99 from all angles. I found it hard to read at Aboriginal Studies Press. PB. $39.95 popular stories about Tony Abbott and his chief times because my heart ached for Ryle and Australia’s remotest regions appeared in of staff, Peta Credlin, ran In this award-winning work her family, but this is an important work by newspapers and journals around the nation. a brilliant opposition Bronwyn Carlson explores a talented writer, and a book I urge you to read. She still remains famous for her bestselling campaign. But their the complexities Nina Kenwood is the marketing manager books The Great Australian Loneliness, The approach led to disaster surrounding Aboriginal for Readings Territory, Flying Doctor Calling and My Love in government. When identity today. Drawing on a Must Wait. Call of the Outback evokes Abbott became prime range of literature, Ernestine’s larger-than-life personality, the minister, he and Credlin interviews and surveys, Biography exotic landscapes she explored and the ruthlessly controlled Carlson explores Aboriginal remarkable characters she met on her travels. ministers, backbenchers, the public service and non-Aboriginal understandings of Aboriginality and the way these are produced THE SHOCK OF and the media. They shut out voices that MICK: A LIFE OF and reproduced across a range of sites and RECOGNITION questioned Abbott’s way. Everything started RANDOLPH STOW to unravel. Credlin & Co. is the story of a contexts. Carlson examines the multiple yet Barry Jones narrow definitions of Aboriginal identity that Suzanne Falkiner relationship that determined the fate of a A&U. PB. Was $32.99 have existed throughout Australia’s colonial UWAP. HB. $50 government. It shows in stunning detail the $27.99 disastrous consequences of power abused, history and their continuing impact upon Randolph Stow was ‘Seize the and the broken people left in its wake. contemporary Aboriginal identities. one of the great moment!’ is the Australian writers of key message in this book his generation. His DESERT WRITING that ultimately raises Cultural Studies novel To the Islands – Terri-ann White (ed.) the question of what written in his early UWAP. PB. $24.99 constitutes an educated twenties after living In September 2013 a MODERN ROMANCE and enlightened mind. on a remote Aboriginal group of intrepid Aziz Ansari & Eric Klinenberg Barry Jones is a well mission – won the writers made their way Penguin. PB. $24.99 recognised Australian Miles Franklin Award to three Australian People today have more icon, and in his latest in 1958. In Mick, Suzanne Falkiner unravels desert settings to work romantic options than at book, The Shock of Recognition, he details the reasons behind Randolph Stow’s quiet with groups and any point in human history, the literature and music that have helped retreat from Australia and the wider individuals wishing to and thanks to social media, to shape his life, his thinking and his literary world. Meticulously researched, write. Both Aboriginal smartphones and online understanding of himself and the world. insightful and at times deeply moving, people with a profound dating, our ability to Despite his assertion that it is not a Falkiner’s biography pieces together an connection to country and residents of connect with these options general guidebook to literature and music, intriguing story from Stow’s personal more recent arrival who had made the is staggering. Yet we also READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 13 have to face absurd new dilemmas, such as we tend not to think about, yet when you Art & Design from the prevailing colonialist attitudes. By what to think when someone doesn’t reply look into it, it is probable that we get as focusing on his portraits and through to your text but has time to post a photo of much pleasure, if not more, from them. with Margaret Snowdon meticulous and wide-ranging research, a pizza on Instagram. While Aziz Ansari Cotter presents a richly detailed, fascinating has long aimed his comedic insight at SERIOUS PLAY account of life in latter nineteenth-century modern relationships, here he teams up Politics Rob Haysom Australia. Roberts, his milieu and his with sociologist Eric Klinenberg to T&H. HB. $80 subjects are a window into our history. research dating cultures from Tokyo to THE WAYS OF THE Kevin Mortensen came to Buenos Aires to Paris. The result is a PHILIP TREACY WORLD prominence in Australia hilarious tour of the romantic landscape. and internationally as an Marion Hume & Philip Treacy David Harvey early and highly regarded Rizzoli. HB. $200 Profile. HB. $45 practitioner of This sumptuous book features History Experiencing the riots, performance art. He the startling, futuristic and despair and injustice of represented Australia at an beautiful designs of 1970s Baltimore led PRIVATE LIVES, PUBLIC early Venice Biennale and was a major international millinery star David Harvey to seek an figure in the Mildura Sculpture Triennials, Treacy within the larger HISTORY explanation of capitalist which helped establish contemporary framework of fashion and Anna Clark inequalities via Marx and sculpture in this country in the 1960s and couture. The book features his collaborations MUP. PB. $27.99 to a sustained intellectual 1970s after a long period in which the art with legendary photographers, designers and The past is popularised engagement that has form languished. The engagement of his art famous personalities – ‘The most interesting by television programs, made him the world’s with the environment and the aesthetic people in the world wear hats and I get to enjoyed by reading leading exponent of Marx’s work. Here the investigation of the non-human, gives it a meet them.’ The legacy of his rural Irish groups, walking groups, reader is taken through the development of singular flavour which resonates with childhood is also expressed and represented historical societies and his unique synthesis of Marxist method and much contemporary practice. As well as in the book through the shapes, colours and heritage tours, and geographical understanding that has introducing his work to a new audience the designs of nature as influences of personal supported by allowed him to develop a series of powerful book is a fascinating historical over-view of significance in his work. unprecedented digital insights over five decades into the ways of the Melbourne art scene. access to archival the world, from the new mechanics of ALEXANDER CALDER records. Yet our history has also become imperialism, crises in financial markets and THE WATCHERS Achim Borchardt-Hume the subject of heated political debate. Here the effectiveness of car strikers in Oxford, Haley Morris-Cafiero Tate Gallery. PB. $55 or HB. $70 historian Anna Clark explores how our to the links between nature and change. The Magenta Foundation. HB. $75 personal pasts intersect with broader American sculptor historical questions. Drawing on Previously published Alexander Calder was a interviews from five communities around Cookery online, this series of radical figure who the country, she uncovers how we think photographs examines pioneered kinetic sculpture, how society uses gaze to bringing movement to about the past in the context of our local THE OLDEST FOODS ON and intimate stories, and the role that project emotion and how static objects. Calder was history plays in our lives. EARTH we interpret the looks of born in Pennsylvania to a family of artists John Newton others. The project began but originally trained as an engineer. He THE ROMANOVS NewSouth. PB. $29.99 after the photographer noticed the facial travelled to Paris in the 1920s, and by 1931 he expressions of a man standing behind her in Simon Sebag Montefiore We celebrate cultural had invented the mobile, a term coined by the self-portrait she had set up in the middle Duchamp to describe Calder’s sculptures W&N. HB. $45 and culinary diversity, yet shun foods that grew of Times Square. Intrigued by the man and a which moved of their own accord. His The Romanovs were the similar photo that followed on the roll of film dynamic works brought to life the avant- most successful dynasty of here before white settlers arrived. We love the photographer decided to set up her garde’s fascination with movement, and modern times, ruling a camera for the purpose of capturing the brought sculpture into the fourth dimension. sixth of the world’s ‘superfoods’ from exotic locations, yet reject expressions of passersby. Each frame is This is the catalogue for the Tate’s surface. How did one chosen based on the strangers in the exhibition that includes major works from family turn a war-ruined those that grow here. John Newton boils down background. By reversing the gaze back on museums around the world, as well as principality into the the strangers, the collection begins a showcasing his collaborative projects in the world’s greatest empire? these paradoxes by arguing that if you are what you eat, we need to eat different conversation about nonverbal interaction and fields of film, theatre, music and dance. And how did they lose it all? This is the the view society has on body image. intimate story of 20 tsars and tsarinas, some foods: foods that will help to reconcile us with the land and its first inhabitants. But THE WORLD OF CHARLES touched by genius, some by madness, but GOATMAN all inspired by holy autocracy and imperial the tide is turning. European Australians AND RAY EAMES Thomas Thwaites ambition. Montefiore’s gripping chronicle are beginning to accept and relish the Catherine Ince ed. PAP. HB. $49.50 reveals their secret world of unlimited flavours of Australia. With recipes from T&H. HB. $99 power and ruthless empire-building, chefs such as Peter Gilmore, Maggie Beer After the dazzling success Charles and Ray Eames overshadowed by palace conspiracy, family and René Redzepi’s sous chef Beau of The Toaster Project, are among the most rivalries, sexual decadence and wild Clugston, The Oldest Foods on Earth will Thomas Thwaites was in a important designers of extravagance, and peopled by a cast of convince you that this is one food slump until a research grant the twentieth century, adventurers, courtesans, revolutionaries revolution that really matters. gave him the opportunity to true pioneers whose work and poets, from Ivan the Terrible to Tolstoy, escape the human world did much to shape the from Queen Victoria to Lenin. and attempt to transform cultural landscape of the Theology himself into a goat. What post-war period and ensues is a hilarious and surreal journey beyond. Bringing together a wealth of Psychology THE NAME OF GOD IS through engineering, design, and psychology material, from newly commissioned essays MERCY as he interviews neuroscientists, animal to reprints of contemporaneous texts, this behaviourists, prosthetists, goat sanctuary richly illustrated publication offers a highly UNFORBIDDEN Pope Francis & Andrea Tornielli workers and goatherds. illuminating and original overview of the Bluebird. HB. Was $32.99 PLEASURES Eameses and their world. Adam Phillips $29.99 TOM ROBERTS & THE Hamish Hamilton. HB. $35 In a conversation with ART OF PORTRAITURE THE AGE OF COLLAGE 2 A great deal has been Vatican expert Andrea Dr Julie Cotter Busch & Klanten eds written, by Tornielli, Pope Francis T&H. HB. $110 Die Gestalten. HB. $99.95 discloses the core of his psychoanalysts, among Better known for his Bringing disparate images papacy and, in his own many others, about the paintings of iconic and items together, collage words, conveys the great pleasures that are nineteenth-century transcends the boundaries message of the Holy Year forbidden to us. But what Australian nationalism such between artistic of Mercy. Through his of the pleasures that are as ‘Shearing the Rams’, ‘A disciplines. Effortlessly own experience as a priest and shepherd, unforbidden and freely Break Away!’, pastoral embracing digital tools the pope talks about mercy, a subject of available to all? In his new book Adam landscapes, cityscapes and and the freedom they offer, collage has made central importance in his teaching and Phillips explores the meanings and beach idylls, Tom Roberts also produced a comeback: the traditionally analogue testimony. He explains the reasons for importance of the Unforbidden, from the approximately 280 portraits. His subjects technique evolving from its roots in this extraordinary Holy Year, and in doing fall of our ‘first parents’ Adam and Eve to were a diverse range of people – socialites, surrealism and Dada. A follow-up to The Age so sums up his teachings and discusses the work of the great nineteenth- and friends, fellow artists, politicians, family, of Collage, the book is a comprehensive the search for peace and meaning. twentieth-century thinkers. Unforbidden people he met on his travels and portraits of showcase of the surprising diversity of this pleasures, he argues, are always the ones Indigenous Australians that broke away genre today. 14 READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016

Picture Books ISAAC AND HIS AMAZING ASPERGER SUPERPOWERS Melanie Walsh Walker. HB. $24.99 Colourful and clear, Isaac and His Amazing Asperger Superpowers! explains the enigma of Junior Fiction Middle Fiction Asperger’s Syndrome. Isaac describes what his life and feelings are like in a TROUBLE AT HOME positive way, even when his behavior Cate Whittle & Kim Gamble ALICE MIRANDA TO THE RESCUE: is challenging. Children with Omnibus. PB. $9.99 BOOK 13 Asperger’s may not be the target audience (although they Ages and ages ago – about two weeks since Jacqueline Harvey will love the superhero analogy) but it is a straightforward next Thursday – a giant green dragon stole Random. PB. $16.99 and engaging way to demystify the syndrome for children Georgia’s baby brother, Godfrey. Well, okay, It’s the beginning of term and whose sibling, friend or classmate has Asperger’s. This is the giant green dragon actually stole the Alice-Miranda is delighted to be back a must for the education sector. For ages 3 and up. house... she saw it all happen. The only at school. Miss Reedy and Mr Alexa Dretzke is from Readings Hawthorn clues are potato chips and sarsaparilla Plumpton’s wedding is fast drink. Can Georgia solve the mystery of the approaching, and Caprice and Millie’s OVER THE OCEAN missing family home? bickering has reached an all-time Taro Gomi high. Nearby, in Winchesterfield, a Hardie Grant. HB. $29.95 series of bizarre characters arrive in A child’s imagination is an Nonfiction town for the country’s most unencumbered expanse and can prestigious dog show. Could their entertain possibilities and wonder that as AMAZING ANIMAL JOURNEYS strange behaviour be hiding something more alarming? If adults we have mostly disengaged from; Chris Packham & Jason Cockcroft (illus.) so, Alice-Miranda will need to act quickly to save the day! when was the last time you really mused Egmont. HB. $19.95 on what is ‘over the ocean’? In this sweet We have been blessed lately with THE BLACKTHORN KEY picture book a child stands at the water’s a wave of beautiful non-fiction Kevin Sands edge pondering what could be outside of her eyes’ view. titles and this book on animal migration Puffin. PB. $16.99 Taro Gomi conjures up different scenarios with lovely around the world is no exception. In It’s a dangerous time to be apprentice blocks of colour and assured brushstrokes which will language simple enough for a five-year- apothecary Christopher Rowe. A wave certainly fire up a child’s wondering and initiate questions old to understand, the narrative of mysterious murders has sent that can lead anywhere, which is just what you want discusses the process of animals shockwaves through London, and soon children to be able to do. For ages 2 and up. Alexa seasonally shifting from one part of the Christopher finds himself on the run. planet to another. With gentle illustrations that feature His only allies are his best friend, Tom, AWAKE BEAUTIFUL CHILD three kids as they explore the oceans, the skies, and the courageous Molly, and a loyal Amy Rosenthal Krouse & Gracia Lam (illus.) fields, we learn facts about different animals and their feathered friend, Bridget. His only Perseus. HB. $22.99 migration patterns. For example, did you know that the clues are a coded message and cryptic New York Times best-selling picture- leatherback turtle has a third eye on top of its head that warning about his master’s most book author Amy Krouse Rosenthal helps it to find its way to a safe beach to breed? This is a dangerous project. The race is on – crack the code and teams up with award-winning artist delightful educational text that will have great appeal for uncover its secret, or become the next victim! Gracia Lam to tell the sweet, simple animal lovers aged 5-9. story of a young child’s typical day Angela Crocombe is from Readings Carlton CONFESSIONS OF AN IMAGINARY from morning to bedtime. Each scene FRIEND is described in three-word ‘ABC’ ANZAC HEROES Michelle Cuevas phrases, such as ‘All Begins Cheerily’ and ‘Always Be Maria Gill S&S. PB. $14.99 Curious.’ Secret ‘ABC’ scenes hidden throughout the Scholastic. HB. $24.99 Fleur and Jacques Papier are artwork encourage multiple readings and reward close- Discover the triumphs and tragedies twins. Jacques loves his sister, looking. An ideal read-aloud book to read just after waking of 24 heroic Australasians during but he’s worried by his parents lack or just before bed. World War I and II. Read the of attention towards him. In fact, biographies of Anzac soldiers, most adults are less than receptive BEAR MAKE DEN medics, a spy, an ambulance driver towards Jacques. Jane Godwin, Michael Wagner, & Andrew and a humanitarian surviving in However, he finds out Fleur has Joyner (illus.) wartime battles. Anzac Heroes been keeping a secret from him and A&U. HB. $24.99 includes famous soldiers such as he is shocked; she has an imaginary Bear loves to get things done. He can make New Zealand’s double Victoria friend, so he decides he must have one just about anything! He even builds a Cross recipient Charles Upham, and much-honoured too. Then one day he meets the roller-skating cowgirl who wonderful den. He is great with his hands, Australian Hughie Edwards, Indigenous soldiers Albert breaks some terrible news to him and life will never be the but not so smart when it comes to Knight from Australia and Peter Buck from New same again. As Jacques comes to terms with who he really relationships. But something is missing. Zealand, and brave women Olive King, Joice Loch, and is and decides he must embark on a new life, things get What could it be? If he fixes up his den, New Zealander Dr Jessie Scott. weirder and sometimes sad but never dull. This is terrific will everything else follow? A warm, fun for real and imaginary children of 7 and up. Alexa playful picture book about what truly makes a home. TIMELINE: AN ILLUSTRATED HISTORY OF THE WORLD CRENSHAW THE STORY OF SNOWFLAKE Peter Goes Katherine Applegate AND INKDROP Gecko. HB. $34.99 HarperCollins. PB. $14.99 Pierdomenico Baccalario, Alessandro Gatti A perfect introduction to history for At age 11 and in the thrall of & Simona Mulazzani young and old, this illustrated journey science, Jackson feels far too Perseus. HB. $29.99 through our world’s culture and events old for his imaginary friend, A big town in winter. A snowflake is travels from the Big Bang to the iPod Crenshaw the cat, who has started about to fall from the sky. An ink drop and into the future. This is a trip reappearing. Crenshaw is taking spills out of its bottle in an artist’s studio. through time that looks at wars and bubble baths, purring like a train and The wind carries the snowflake through disasters, introduces artists, explorers dispensing unwelcome advice. The the town, and the ink drop out of the and leaders, shows us living in castles, last time Crenshaw was around, window into the sky. Where will each yurts and skyscrapers. There are even Jackson’s family had fallen on hard land? Two worlds, two intersecting dragons, mythical figures and TV characters, alongside times and had to live in their car for stories of a snowflake and an ink drop – could it be that world-changing scientific inventions. Each scene puts three months. Now, Jackson is seriously worried that the they’re destined to be friends? global events in perspective. family might end up in the car again. But Crenshaw insists READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 15

Book of the Month

IRIS AND THE TIGER Leanne Hall Text. PB. $16.99

Iris and the Tiger has all the hallmarks of a classic children’s novel – a reclusive relative, a labyrinthine house peopled with mysterious characters, secrets, quests, and impossible creatures, but the story itself is firmly grounded in the modern world.

Iris is a sensible and pragmatic twelve-year-old; capable of faking a mobile phone drop-out to busy-body parents and not naive enough to think that she’s been sent to stay with her Great Aunt Ursula for any other reason than to spy and report back to her avaricious mother and father. But when Iris arrives at the grand estate Bosque de Nubes any intention of fulfilling her mission to maneuver herself into prime inheritance position disappears when she’s confronted by a world that seems to have sprung fully formed from the Surrealist movement. Perhaps Great Aunt Ursula isn’t the doddery old biddy that Iris was led to expect, but a spirited (if eccentric) matriarch who holds dominion over an enchanted world full of carnivorous cars, suit-wearing praying mantises, ensorcelled boots, and the magnificent, mysterious, missing tiger.

But Bosque De Nubes is under threat from outside developers who want to strip the magic from the land and turn the forest into a Surrealist theme park, and Iris is left wondering how she and her new friend Jordi can help save a place she’s come to love when she’s there with an ulterior motive of her own. Iris and the Tiger is a great adventure novel that will appeal to kids aged 10 and up.

Lian Hingee is the digital marketing manager for Readings

New Kids’ Classic of the Month MOMO Michael Ende Puffin. PB. $14.95 German author Michael Ende Books might be better known for his THE LAST IMMORTAL novel The Neverending Story, but it is Alex Marlowe the sweet and magical Momo that Little, Brown. PB. $14.99 holds first place in my heart. Momo is In Victorian London, 13-year-old Luke a surreal (and at times creepy) fantasy he won’t leave until he has helped Jackson and his family, Frankenstein dreams of joining the about time theft, starring a very including his little sister Robin, whom Jackson tries to Immortals – a supernatural crime- charming heroine. shield from the worst of their poverty. fighting squad, founded by his father The mysterious Momo sets up On one level, this is a terribly sad story of a Victor. But when Luke secretly follows camp in an abandoned amphitheatre hardworking family struggling to make ends meet, but it is the Immortals on a mission against the in a city that resembles Rome, and also a look at how kids develop resilience in difficult times. Dark Pharaoh Sanakhte, he is killed, his is adopted by concerned locals. Momo is ageless, wise, The relationship between Jackson and Crenshaw provides body preserved for 160 years before he without possessions and thoroughly enigmatic (‘I’ve always comic relief and the story is very sensitively handled. is reanimated in the modern day with been around’ she says, when asked where she was born). Katherine Applegate won the Newberry Medal for her last superhuman powers. Sanakhte has returned and Luke Momo soon enchants the adults with her superior listening novel for this age group, The One and Only Ivan, and this must reunite the scattered Immortals. But to destroy skills, and the children with her powers of make-believe. story is also beautifully written, moving and occasionally Sanakhte, Luke must uncover a terrible secret hidden in This updated cover is by my favourite illustrator, Chris funny. It’s suitable for readers aged 9 and up. Angela his past. Riddell, but the cover I remember from my childhood attracted me with Momo’s black hair and brown skin – a ISLAND SOCKS, SANDBAGS & LEECHES rare sight on kids’ books in the 1980s. Nicky Singer Pauline Deeves The story takes a sinister turn when grey-suited, grey- skinned businessmen infiltrate the relaxed city, urging MMS. PB. $14.99 National Library of Australia. HB. $24.99 citizens to work harder and play less, so they might deposit Urban teenager Cameron arrives on an As the Great War rages far from their ‘saved time’ in the Timesavings Bank. This kind of uninhabited Arctic Island. He’s prepared Australia, Ivy writes to her father, who drab, workaholic attitude does not play with our in-the- for ice and storms and, stripped of his is fighting overseas. She tells him all moment Momo, and when it becomes apparent that the smart technology, for boredom. But he’s about life at home – how the family has Men In Grey’s savings scheme is literally sucking the city not prepared for 24-hour daylight and little money; how she and other dry of spare time, it is up to her to save the day. erupting graves! At first Cameron children have to sew sandbags, knit Momo is full of imagination and bravery and friendship, believes the explanations of his research socks and roll up bandages, and and has an important message for modern readers in a scientist mother. But, as the island reveals volunteer for the Cheer Up Society. In time-poor and overscheduled world. itself to him, he begins to see, and hear, the 20 letters, written between 1914 and 1918, Socks, things that push him right to the edge of the possible. One of Sandbags and Leeches shows what life was like for people Leanne Hall is from Readings Hawthorn them is an Inuit girl. The other is a large white bear. on the home front, and Australia’s attitude towards the war. 16 READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016

ANIMAL WISE key concepts. In The Great Philosophers, never stops revealing layer after layer of recipes come from, who invented them, and Virginia Morell Stephen Law condenses and deciphers their this complex and often anguished artist how they were originally cooked? William fundamental ideas. Avoiding the technical and man. In the wake of Lou’s death, this Sitwell explores the fascinating history HB. Was $52 jargon and complex logic associated with updated biography includes previously of cuisine from the first cookbook to the Now $16.95 most books on philosophy, Law brings the unseen photographs and contributions from first cupcake, from the invention of the Did you know that ants thoughts of these great thinkers to life. Lou’s innermost circle and collaborators. sandwich to the rise of food television. A teach, earthworms make riveting narrative history of the recipes and decisions, rats love to be tickled, and chimps HOW PROUST WHY BE HAPPY dishes we now take for granted. grieve? That crows improvise tools, blue CAN CHANGE WHEN YOU jays plan ahead, and moths remember YOUR LIFE COULD BE WHEN I AM living as caterpillars? Noted science writer PLAYING WITH Virginia Morell explores the frontiers Alain de Botton NORMAL? of research on animal cognition and PB. Was $24.99 Jeanette Winterson MY CAT, HOW emotion, offering a surprising and moving Now $12.95 HB. Was $39.95 Now $15.95 DO I KNOW SHE exploration into the hearts and minds of Renowned philosopher Alain de Botton Documenting a life’s work to find happiness, IS NOT PLAYING wild and domesticated animals. transforms Proust’s life and work into Winterson’s memoir is full of stories: about WITH ME? a modern, no-nonsense guide to topics a religious zealot disguised as a mother Saul Frampton THE BEST OF such as enjoying your vacation, reviving a waiting for Armageddon; about growing HB. Was $49.95 Now $16.95 up in an industrial town now changed GRETTA ANNA relationship, avoiding clichés, first dates, Over the course of his writing life, beyond recognition. Witty, acute, fierce, Gretta Anna Teplitzky being a good host and recognising love. Montaigne gradually turned from grief- and celebratory, Winterson’s memoir is a & Martin Teplitzky De Botton finds the inspiration in Proust’s stricken fatalism to a philosophy that essays, letters, and fiction and draws out a tough-minded search for belonging, for love, HB. Was $49.99 identity, home, and a mother. embraced life – the touch of a hand, the Now $17.95 vivid and clarifying portrait of the master playfulness of his cat, the flavour of his from between the lines of his work. Gretta Anna Teplitzky did for Australian THE SPOKEN wine. Saul Frampton offers a celebration of the Renaissance writer, whose essays cuisine what Julia Child did for American, A LOMBARDIAN WORD introducing home cooks to her own unique went on to have a huge impact on The British Library style of fabulous French-style cooking with COOKBOOK Western letters, and even today offer 3CDs. Was $59.95 Now $16.95 practical, no-nonsense recipes that work Alessandro unprecedented insight into the simple every time. Here, for the first time, is an Pavoni & This 3-CD compilation forms matter of being alive. updated selection of recipes from her two Roberta part of the British Library’s bestselling books, lovingly curated by her Muir series of documentary THE GOOD son Martin, as well as 60 original, never- HB. Was $59.99 recordings by English- BOOK language authors before-published recipes. Now $24.95 A.C. Grayling and playwrights, Renowned chef HB. Was $69.95 Alessandro featuring around 30 DANUBIA Now $16.95 Simon Winder Pavoni hails from Bargain writers talking about A powerful, non-religious Lombardy, home their lives and work. PB. Was $29.99 alternative to the Bible, A.C. Grayling to some of Italy’s The recordings derive Now $13.95 draws from the wealth of secular most famous dishes, primarily from BBC Readers who loved Simon Table literature and philosophy in both Western including osso bucco, broadcasts, the earliest of Winder’s genius for telling and Eastern traditions, using the same bollito misto and panettone. them dating from the 1930s, wonderful stories of middle techniques that produced the holy books In his first cookbook Alessandro and include historic recordings from Europe with Germania will be delighted by of the Abrahamic religions. Meditating on reveals the secrets to these traditional figures such as Rudyard Kipling, Virginia his eccentric and fascinating stories of the the origin of the world, how life should be classics, along with more than 100 of his Woolf, Ian Fleming and Harold Pinter. Habsburgs, an unstable dynasty of wizards, lived and how we relate to one another, treasured family recipes. obsessives, melancholics, bores, musicians PARIS BETWEEN the book incorporates writing from and warriors, who ruled Central Europe and THE WARS Herodotus, Confucius, Seneca and Cicero, Germany for centuries. MUSINGS Montaigne, Bacon, and many others. FROM THE Vincent Bouvet & THE EDIBLE INNER DUCK Gerard Durozoi NOTES FROM HB. Was $90 CITY Michael Leunig Now $29.95 THE LARDER Indira Naidoo PB. Was $24.99 Now $11.95 In the years following World War I, Paris Nigel Slater PB. Was $45 Michael Leunig’s poignantly hilarious new underwent a creative fever that brought artists HB. Was $49.99 Now $17.95 cartoon collection ranges from Curly Flat to and intellectuals from around the world to Now $24.95 From managing restaurant the Global Positioning Sausage, accompanied the City of Light. The bohemian charms of Britain’s foremost food waste, to helping the homeless, to teaching by the direction-finding duck. This collection Montparnasse and a vibrant cafe culture writer returns with his quietly passionate, schoolchildren about Indigenous heritage, of 138 cartoons tilts towards the whimsical, gave rise to a dynamic group of expatriate idiosyncratic musings on a year in the join Indira as she visits some of Australia’s the wise and the sublimely misaligned; writers. Paris Between the Wars showcases kitchen, alongside more than 250 simple most innovative and memorable kitchen it’s less heavily political than previous this creative energy, establishing Paris as the and seasonal recipes. Based on Slater’s garden initiatives. Indira also offers collections, although the political system epicentre of new trends in the arts, a position journal entries, Notes from the Larder is a gardening tips and practical advice on cops a serve here and there. it would occupy until World War II. collection of small kitchen celebrations – setting up your own community garden, as through this personal selection of recipes, well as 40 delicious recipes. ONE THOUSAND ON Slater offers a glimpse into the daily AND ONE ARCHITECTURE inspiration behind his cooking and the THE GENIUS OF pleasures of making food by hand. NIGHTS Ada Louise Huxtable DOGS Hanan al-Shaykh PB. Was $44 ALEXANDER Brian Hare & Vanessa HB. Was $39.95 Now $16.95 Woods Now $15.95 MCQUEEN For more than half a century, HB. Was $45 Now $16.95 Claire Wilcox Passed down over the centuries from Ada Louise Huxtable’s keen eye and vivid HB. Was $90 Breakthroughs in cognitive across the Arab world, One Thousand and writing have reinforced to readers the Now $29.95 science in the past decade, pioneered by One Nights tells of the beautiful, wise, importance and fascination of architecture. Brian Hare, have shown that when dogs young Shahrazad, who prolongs her On Architecture collects the best of This definitive domesticated themselves 40,000 years ago, life at the hands of a murderdous king Huxtable’s writing, charting the twentieth publication on they developed a whole new kind of social by cunningly spinning a web of stories. century’s most important architectural Alexander McQueen invites you into the intelligence, becoming far more like human Acclaimed Lebanese writer Hanan masters and projects, cataloguing the creative mind of one of Britain’s most infants than their wolf ancestors. The Genius al-Shaykh retells 19 of these stories in seismic shifts in style, function, and brilliant, daring and provocative designers. of Dogs offers revolutionary new insights modern English, knitting them together fashion that have led to the dramatic new Including over 440 striking images, from into the interior lives of our smartest pets. into an utterly intoxicating collection. architecture of the twenty-first century. intimate backstage portraits and editorials by leading fashion photographers to THE GREAT TRANSFORMER A HISTORY OF previously unpublished sketches and PHILOSOPHERS Victor Bockris FOOD IN 100 research boards, this comprehensive catalogue features 28 ground-breaking Stephen Law PB. Was $22.99 Now $13.95 RECIPES PB. Was $19.99 Following the great essays from expert fashion commentators William Sitwell and cultural scholars which examine the Now $12.95 songwriter and singer HB. Was $69.95 Now $19.95 Whilst most people have heard through the series of richness and complexity of McQueen’s of Socrates, Machiavelli and Nietzsche, transformations that define each period of We all love to eat – but how visionary fashion. many are less clear on their theories and Lou Reed’s fifty year career, Transformer many of us know where our much-loved READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 17

New Film & TV appreciation for the poetry of political National Lottery jackpot … is boosted by some corruption and urban decay … that makes it fine acting. Lenny Henry has a gift for drama.’ with Lou Fulco intriguing.’– The New York Times – The Telegraph DVD of the Month PLEASE LIKE ME: SEASON 3 Documentary THE YOUNG MONTALBANO: VOLUME 2 $39.95 $49.95 ‘Please Like Me constructs WOMEN HE’S It has been over three years since the first season of this brilliant a challenge to [standard] UNDRESSED Italian crime drama was made available, but the wait has been worth “millennial” comedy. Few recent portraits $34.95 it. This new series was supervised by the writer of the original books, of my generation have so successfully ‘With a wealth of clips from Andrea Camilleri, and continues to explore the origins of the man we have captured the rumpled texture of the Golden Age films, [Hollywood come to know simply as ‘Montalbano’. It also gives us some insight into the Sicilian police experience … its broader observations feel costume designer] Orry-Kelly’s talent detective’s relationships with his co-workers, his love of food, his love-life and his wholly earned.’ – IndieWire speaks for itself, and interviews with the continuing lack of patience with life and people in general. likes of Angela Lansbury and Jane Fonda THE RETURNED: offer first-hand accounts of this member ‘While dealing with numerous low-lifes, simpletons, unreliable SEASON 2 of the Hollywood gumleaf mafia.’ – The witnesses and, of course, the mafia, Montalbano also has to deal with an $29.95 Daily Telegraph unexpected, though pleasant, arrival.’ ‘Everything that made the first season of the French zombie GAYBY BABY Episode One begins with a murder (of course!) but what takes centre stage is his relationship drama The Returned brilliant and deeply $24.95 with his girlfriend, Livia. While dealing with numerous low-lifes, simpletons, unreliable unsettling is back in the second season … ‘Maya Newell looks at the witnesses and, of course, the mafia, he also has to deal with an unexpected, though pleasant, It’s a series that will haunt you – in the best lives of modern children arrival: Livia. Without giving too much away, the first episode ends with a proposal (of sorts), a possible way.’ – San Francisco Chronicle of same-sex parents in bus departing and second thoughts, all within the space of a minute or so. Hysterical! this much-anticipated From then on we get more of the usual excellent fare of mysteries to solve, but the SHERLOCK: THE crowdfunded doco … It’s a compassionately dynamics between Montalbano and Livia, and especially between Montalbano and his ABOMINABLE made documentary that’s ultimately all best friend and second-in-charge, Mimi, make for humorous interludes beyond the life of BRIDE about our similarities.’ – Junkee a cop in Vigata, Sicily. Michele Riondino gives us a wonderful performance as the prickly $24.95 Montalbano and, along with a great cast, leaves us wanting more – more of Sicily, more ‘Excellent performances, THE WOLFPACK great food and more episodes of this brilliant crime drama. razor-sharp dialogue, lush $24.95 Lou Fulco is from Readings Hawthorn visuals … Add in incredible costuming, a ‘Crystal Moselle’s few well-earned scares, and some fun fan- documentary about a family service, and you’ve got a hell of a recipe virtually imprisoned in their Film LEARNING TO for a moody, Holmesian confection.’ – The New York flat for decades DRIVE A.V. Club [but] allowed to watch a broad spectrum HOLDING THE MAN $29.95 of movies … is necessarily basic but ‘Touching, insightful and MAPP & LUCIA fundamentally joyful.’ – The Guardian $39.95 occasionally unpredictable … $19.95 ‘This compelling true story of Patricia Clarkson as a jilted wife and Ben ‘As two 1930s society mavens THE WRECKING two Melbourne schoolboys who Kingsley as her Indian driving instructor engaged in increasingly CREW fall in love despite their Catholic made a great odd couple in this unflashy deranged warfare, Anna $19.95 upbringing and the intense misgivings of but dependable comedy.’ – The Guardian Chancellor and Miranda their parents powerfully connects with the ‘This lively and infectious Richardson lead us gloriously into a world of audience.’ – The Herald Sun music documentary … refers TV ludicrous standoffs and Italian hogwashery.’ to the Los Angeles session musicians SAINT LAURENT – The Guardian who played on many of the greatest pop music recordings of the 1960s and 70s. $24.95 THE SYNDICATE: A fascinating story that deserves to be ‘An imperfect but often TRUE DETECTIVE: seen – and most importantly, heard.’ – poetic take on the life of a SEASON 2 SERIES 3 The Herald Sun fashion mogul … Saint Laurent $39.95 $29.95 captures both the private frustration and ‘True Detective is monochromatic ‘This third series of Kay the private sense of accomplishment that and self-serious, but it builds Mellor’s drama which, again, comes with making art.’ – The A.V. Club suspense with finesse and has a keen focuses on a group of people who scoop the

ROOM Now showing (M) ANOMALISA Opens February 4 (CTC) BROOKLYN Opens February 11 (M) Adapted from Emma Donoghue's novel, ROOM is the story of Jack, Oscar-winning writer and director Charlie Kaufman (Being John Adapted from Colm Tóibín’s acclaimed novel by best-selling a 5 year-old, looked after by his Ma (Brie Larson). Ma is dedicated to Malkovich) returns with an intimate drama unlike any of the author Nick Hornby and directed by John Crowley, BROOKLYN is keeping Jack happy and safe, playing games and telling stories. filmmaker’s previous work. Collaborating with stop-motion the story of a young woman, Eilis (Saoirse Ronan) who moves from However, they are trapped in a windowless, 10-by-10-foot space Ma animator Duke Johnson, Kaufman adapts his own play for the small town Ireland to Brooklyn, New York where, unlike home, she has named "Room." As Ma's resilience reaches breaking point, they screen to create a relatable, expressive and human world without has the opportunity for work and for a future - and love, in the enact a risky plan to escape. live action performances. Motivational speaker Michael Stone form of Italian-American Tony (Emory Cohen). When a family Page to Picture discussion Sunday 31 January, 3pm (voiced by David Thewlis) arrives in Cincinnati for a sold-out stage tragedy brings her back to Ireland, she finds herself absorbed into Join us for a screening and discussion of the novel and its appearance. Checking into the Fregoli Hotel, he awkwardly attempts her old community, but now with eligible Jim (Domhnall Gleeson) adaptation to film. The panel features Amy Vuleta (Readings to reconnect with a past flame before unexpectedly meeting Lisa, a courting her. As she repeatedly postpones her return to America, bookseller), Jo Case, (Melbourne Writers Festival Program young woman attending his seminar (Jennifer Jason Leigh), whom Eilis finds herself confronting a terrible dilemma - a heart- Manager), Melanie Joosten (author of Berlin Syndrome), to be he finds to be utterly unique. breaking choice between two men and two countries. hosted by writer & broadcaster Alicia Sometimes (774 ABC, 3RRR). Book tickets online or at the Cinema Nova Box Office. 380 Lygon Street Carlton Melbourne’s home of quality arthouse and contemporary cinema cinemanova.com.au 18 READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016

New Music WONDERFUL CRAZY alongside trumpet, piano riffs, and bluesy NIGHT vocals. The Honeydrops’ sound crosses genres from Bay Area music, R&B, Funk, Elton John Album of the Month Southern Soul, Delta Blues and New $24.95 Orleans second-line. The legendary Elton John THE GHOSTS OF HIGHWAY 20 releases his 33rd studio LET ME GET BY album, Wonderful Crazy Lucinda Williams Tedeschi Trucks Band Night, reuniting with the 2CD. $24.95 $24.95 Elton John Band for the first time in ten The Ghosts of Highway 20 traverses the northern part of Williams’ The third full-length album years. With all songs recorded in one or home state of Louisiana and is a route she knows only too well from by Florida-based 12-piece two takes, including infectious lead single constantly travelling back and forth to gigs when she was getting her career up and running all Tedeschi Trucks Band ‘Looking Up’, Wonderful Crazy Night also those years ago. The characters that inhabit this world provide most of the inspiration for her 11 features 10 new, original marks the continuation of Elton’s incredible, new songs. There are also two covers, Springsteen’s ‘Factory’ and a recreation of a forgotten songs that together stand as a testament inexhaustible 48-year songwriting Woody Guthrie tune, ‘House of Earth’. to the hard work, independent spirit, and partnership with Bernie Taupin. It was always going to be tough following up on her epic work Down Where the Spirit full-on commitment of the entire Tedeschi Meets the Bone. With The Ghosts of Highway 20, Williams has decided to do something a Trucks Band. Susan Tedeschi’s vocals and little different, and she has pulled it off. The familiar themes of love, friends in trouble, bad Jazz & Blues Derek Trucks’ guitar soar, tumble and glide relationships and death are all here. There are also detailed childhood recollections of growing through each song, as powerful as ever, even up in the Deep South. The mood here is more downbeat than usual, many of the songs are half- in the album’s most understated moments. spoken, half-sung. However, none of this is a problem and Williams’ band is easily up to the PAST PRESENT challenge of providing amazingly exciting, emotional and fresh musical settings. Main guitarist John Scofield and pedal steel player Greg Leisz was on the 1998 breakthrough album Car Wheels on a Gravel $26.95 Folk & World Road and Down Where the Spirit Meets the Bone. Having also been co-producer on several Celebrated jazz guitarist recent albums, he rises to the challenge brilliantly here and brings his friend Bill Frisell along John Scofield reunites with for part of the ride. There is exquisite guitar interplay on the rockier numbers and atmospheric FRUGALISTO drummer Bill Stewart and settings when the mood calls for it. Luka Bloom saxophonist Joe Lovano, $24.95 Paul Barr is from Readings Carlton with whom he released three critically Eighteen months in acclaimed albums in the early 1990s, adding the making, legendary bassist Larry Grenadier for new album Past English band’s most ambitious, diverse Irish singer–songwriter Present. Infused with Scofield’s love of Blues Pop & Rock and elaborate album in recent years. Luka Bloom returns with his new album and R&B, the album continues to solidify Conceived in tandem with a short film Frugalisto. Written in his home of County Scofield’s reputation as one of modern jazz’s project and featuring a poignant duet with Clare, the songs are inspired by the people BLACKSTAR most fresh and dynamic guitarists. the late Lhasa De Sela, the established and places that have had an impact on David Bowie masters of restraint and poetic human THIS NARROW ISTHMUS him – including the title track, about a $21.95 emotion are now confidently creating the sustainable living community near his Julien Wilson Released on David Bowie’s best songs of their career. hometown, and the song ‘Australia’, a love $24.95 69th birthday and just song to a country he’s toured extensively. days before his death, SYNTHIA Recorded live in Sydney, Blackstar is Bowie’s 28th The Jezabels at the fourth of only five NÉ SO studio album and his first since stunning the shows that the quartet ever Available 12 February. Rokia Traoré world in 2013 with the critically acclaimed played, this is the quartet’s $19.95 Available 12 February. The Next Day. Featuring Gregorian chants, second and final album. Where the band’s Award-winning indie- $24.95 a soul section, various electronic beats and award-winning debut This is Always focused rock quartet The Jezabels Rokia Traoré’s sixth Bowie’s distinctive vocals, the album has on standards and ballads, This Narrow return with their third album, Né So (‘Home’), been revealed by producer Tony Visconti as Isthmus leans towards the blues and consists studio album Synthia. With long-time continues the Malian singer–songwriter Bowie’s parting gift to his fans. wholly of original compositions. producer Lachlan Mitchell back at the desk and multi-instrumentalist’s fusion of HOLD ON and a growing arsenal of new and vintage A LIFE IN A DAY traditional Malian music and African rock. keyboards pushing the textural frontier, Featuring 10 original songs and a cover of The James Hunter Six David Ades Synthia is a bold assertion of craft that sets Billie Holiday’s ‘Strange Fruit’, the album Available 5 February. $24.95 The Jezabels apart in a world groaning also includes guest performances by John $22.95 with blokes doing their best impersonation The last album made by Paul Jones, Toni Morrison, and Devendra James Hunter has earned of rock authenticity. Australian alto sax legend Banhart, and instrumentalists from an international reputation David Ades with his New throughout Africa. as a R&B troubadour for his buoyant JESU/SUN KIL MOON York mates, A Life in a Day energy, crackerjack arrangements, and Sun Kil Moon & Jesu is gritty and honest, passionate, immediate THE TRAVELLER tough soulful pulse. His fourth album, and forthright. Recorded only a few weeks $24.95 Baaba Maal his first with Daptone Records, is packed before Ades died from lung cancer, the A collaboration between $19.95 with rumbas, boleros, bossanovas, and players blend and twist together in a truly folk-rock icon Mark The 11th album from easy rockers, each one swinging more than organic way. Kozelek and Godflesh’s the last; songs crafted with immaculate Senegalese master Justin Broadrick, Jesu/ care and ingenuity, sung with an effortless WHAT WAS SAID musician and cultural Sun Kil Moon is the culmination of years warrior Baaba Maal is a mixture of African balance of tenderness and grit. Tord Gustavsen of friendship and one-off collaborations roots sounds and cutting-edge western $29.95 ART ANGELS between the two artists. With track titles electro elements. Recorded in London and such as ‘Last Night I Rocked the Room What Was Said brings new Senegal in collaboration with The Very Grimes Like Elvis and Had Them Laughing Like colours to Tord Gustavsen’s Best’s Johan Hugo Karlberg, The Traveller $21.95 Richard Pryor’, the album also features musical palette. His latest harnesses production techniques that defy Spanning 14 tracks, guest appearances from Bonnie ‘Prince’ trio project with drummer Jarle Vespestad Afropop standards and showcase a wider Grimes’ fourth album Billy, members of Low, Rachel Goswell of and Afghan-German vocalist Simin Tander Senegalese point of view. Art Angels features Slowdive and Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse. explores the tradition of Norwegian church collaborations with Janelle Monáe and music in a most untraditional way, working AT THE EDGE OF THE newcomer, Taiwanese rapper Aristophanes. ADORE LIFE with an Afghan poet to translate a selection BEGINNING Featuring more live instrumentation Savages of Norwegian hymns into Pashto with piano and discreet electronics. Idan Raichel than ever before on a Grimes record, $24.95 the Canadian artist plays piano, guitar $24.95 London post-punk and violin, continuing her evolution as A RIVER’S INVITATION Idan Raichel goes back band Savages follow a musician and a producer for her most The California to basics on his intimate up their breakthrough ambitious album to date. Honeydrops new album At the Edge debut album Silence Yourself with Adore $19.95 of the Beginning. An introspective work, Life, recorded in London in April 2015. consisting of mostly gentle, personal THE WAITING ROOM The California Promising more of the band’s trademark songs with unassuming melodies and Tindersticks Honeydrops don’t just energy and intensity, the album is arrangements, the album represents a $19.95 play music, they throw parties! The about change and the power to change, turn inward for the global music star Tindersticks’ tenth studio American band’s fifth album, the follow and about the music and the message and reflects on the cycles of life, human album, their first since up to 2013’s Like You Mean It, features together, one and the same; bass, guitars, connections and starting anew. 2012’s critically acclaimed drums and vocals. unusual instruments including a home- The Something Rain, is the made gutbucket bass, jug, and washboard, READINGS MONTHLY FEBRUARY 2016 19

New Classical Music BRAHMS: VIOLIN THE BEST OF PLÁCIDO CONCERTO & BARTOK: DOMINGO Classical Album of the Month VIOLIN CONCERTO NO. 1 Plácido Domingo Janine Jansen & Sony 88875123122. Antonio Pappano LES ÉLÉMENTS: TEMPÊTES, ORAGES 4CDs. $49.95 Decca. 4788412. $24.95 To celebrate Plácido ET FÊTES MARINES ‘Jansen gives us a lyric Domingo’s 75th birthday, Jordi Savall & Le Concert des Nations reading [of the Brahms] which was on the 21st Alia Vox. AVSA9914. 2CDs. $29.95 of rare inwardness of January of this year, Sony Classical have Christmas Day. It’s thirty-five degrees, I’m stuck on the and beauty ... it is a performance that released the anniversary album The Best of freeway, and my air-conditioning has packed it in. A hot marries meditation with motion, Plácido Domingo. Specially selected from wind pummels the side of my car. I’m desperate to get home. I such is the suppleness of Jansen’s and the great Spanish singer’s vast discography turn up the volume on my stereo system, playing Les Éléments Pappano’s feel for the concerto’s larger of over 200 recordings, this 4-CD set spans – Jordi Savall’s most recent recording on his Alia Vox label. The music – so relaxingly symphonic movement and the hand-in- almost half a century in the musical life beautiful – offers relief. glove relationship that exists between of a prodigiously talented, much-loved Through his selection of compositions, Savall aims to depict man’s tempestuous soloist, conductor and Pappano’s superbly performer. relationship with the forces of nature. Each work bears some significance to the theme, responsive Santa Cecilia orchestra.’ such as Vivaldi’s Tempesta di mare, which literally means ‘Storm at Sea’. He writes, ‘It is – Gramophone FRENCH CONNECTIONS: not too late to save the planet through cooperation, investment and our common resolve. SONGS BY LENNOX And music, with its “tempests and its storms” reminds us, the earth will be what we PLEASURE GARDEN BERKELEY, BRITTEN, make of it!’ Genevieve Lacey HEGGIE & POULENC ABC. Classics. 4812370 John Mark Ainsley ‘It’s thirty-five degrees, I’m stuck on the freeway, and my air- $24.95 & Malcolm conditioning has packed it in. A hot wind pummels the side Recorder virtuosa Martineau Genevieve Lacey Linn. CKD477. $29.95 explores gardens, of my car. The music – so relaxingly beautiful – offers relief.’ ‘Ainsley’s searing real and imagined, old and new – from performance of the original Pleasure Garden, a series of Savall hasn’t strayed far from his usual fare: lesser-known baroque music, [the Britten] fully justifies their being exquisite musical vignettes by the Dutch predominantly French composers, and a well-thought-out concept. And, as usual, this included ... Martineau’s perceptive nobleman Jacob van Eyck, to contemporary is a tight, well-produced offering, from the exquisitely clear sound of the orchestra, to accompaniments echo the poignancy of compositions contemplating our the attractive packaging and informative liner notes. It’s for these reasons that Savall’s the sentiments voiced in the texts, and the relationship with the botanical world. recordings are loved and celebrated, and Les Éléments is yet another triumph. collaboration between him and Ainsley The album takes its title from Jean-Féry Rebel’s spectacular Les Éléments, for which BLACKBIRD: THE is one of mature understanding both of the composer uses discord to depict chaos. Music from Marin Marais’ Alcione is another one another’s interpretative stance and of highlight. Here, instruments rumble to create the sound of the raging winds, swiftly BEATLES ALBUM the sophistication of Britten’s language.’ contrasted by the elegant, courtly music for which Marais is famous. A Gavotte from Miloš Karadaglic – Gramophone Magazine Telemann’s Water Music (1740) had my toes tapping, as did the final stirring Contredanse Mercury. 4812310. $24.95 trés vive from Rameau’s Les Boréades. After having explored the Sitting in traffic in intense heat seems a fitting place to listen to such a poignantly core classical heritage Classical Specials curated collection of baroque music, delivering this otherwise stressed driver safely of the guitar in his three home on Christmas Day. previous albums, Miloš makes a thrilling THE JOHN ELIOT Alexandra Mathew is from Readings Carlton new departure. Miloš performs dazzling GARDINER COLLECTION and innovative new arrangements of classic John Eliot Gardiner songs by the Beatles, collaborating with MOZART: THE WEBER GIOVINCELLO celebrated artists from the pop, jazz, world DG. 4791044. 30 CDs. SISTERS Edgar Moreau music and classical fields, such as Tori Was $104.95 $63.95 while stocks last Sabine Devieilhe Erato. 2564605266. $24.95 Amos, Gregory Porter, Anoushka Shankar, and Steven Isserlis. Originally released in Erato. 2564601625. $24.95 Twenty-one year 2013 to coincide with Mozart’s concert old cellist Edgar LALO: PIANO TRIOS his 70th birthday, this box set of 30 CDs, aria Vorrei Moreau is ‘keen to break Lenore Trio featuring choral, orchestral, and operatic Spiegarvi, oh Dio, down … stylistic masterpieces from the Baroque to the composed for the soprano barriers’. Whatever he Hyperion. CDA68113. modern era, brings together some of John Aloysia Weber, is one of does, it’s certainly $29.95 Eliot Gardiner’s most acclaimed recordings the most challenging and impressive, and I can’t help but compare ‘The excellent Leonore for Archiv, Deutsche Grammophon, and beautiful in the repertoire. The singer him to the young Jacqueline du Pré who Trio certainly give Philips. It’s an overwhelmingly vocal calls out to God, telling him of her recorded a similar repertoire at the same their all in these collection, a sequence of highly dramatic suffering and professing her unrequited age. Even the title Giovincello – ‘youngster’, often exciting and beautiful works, most musical works that faithfully reflects love, at which point she ascends to an E, here interpreted as ‘young cellist’ – is apt. especially the B minor Trio, No. 2. There’s Gardiner’s musical ideals and predilections. one of the highest notes across the entire Moreau plays with youthful ebullience – a high virtuosity all round – superb light, operatic repertoire. How, then, does necessary quality for this early repertoire dazzling backgrounds from Tim Horton, MENDELSSOHN: A Sabine Devieilhe tackle this challenge? – and he possesses a warm, almost searing intensity of tone from violinist Listening to the recording, you’d be romantic, tone. His vibrato is languid but Benjamin Nabarro and cellist Gemma MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S forgiven for thinking that it’s actually no never too wide, which prevents him from Rosefield. Now and then you might wonder DREAM & PIANO challenge, considering the ease with sounding thin or non-committal even in the if they’re overstating the case; but get into CONCERTOS 1 & 2 which Devieilhe sings. Her top notes most rapid passages of the Vivaldi cello the spirit and it’s terrific stuff.’ – BBC Music Riccardo Chailly & bloom with full and free – but never concerto in A minor. Magazine Saleem Ashkar The Boccherini is a favourite of mine, loose – vibrato. Her tone is so beautiful, Decca. 4810778. and Moreau’s interpretation stands up and her intonation so perfect, that her SCHUBERT, BEETHOVEN, Was $26.95 $11.95 to the best recordings. His playing is voice needs to be heard to be believed. BRAHMS & RAMEAU: while stocks last Devieilhe’s coloratura is acrobatic without elegant and controlled, and his technical MUSIC FOR SOLO PIANO ‘For collectors, the main seeming laboured, sparkling like vocal assurance and faultless intonation suggest Grigory Sokolov item of interest on this disc is the original fireworks in the fiendishly difficult Der a real intelligence and musical maturity. 1839 version of the overture ‘Ruy Blas’ … Hölle Rache from Die Zauberflöte. But While the lesser know Platti and Graziani DG. 4795426. $24.95 it’s fascinating to hear Mendelssohn’s this is not to say she’s incapable of are fabulous and fun – essential attributes Grigory Sokolov is an first thoughts … a well-filled disc. The delivering profound simplicity: her for a baroque cello concerto – Moreau will exceptional artist. He performances are crisp and lively … the interpretation of the song ‘Dans un bois most likely be judged on his recording of is regarded as one of music is always kept moving. The piano solitaire’ is pure, unadorned beauty. The the Haydn C major concerto. Does he pass the world’s leading concertos are brilliantly played, and ensemble Pygmalion under Raphaël muster? Frankly, yes. Moreau’s spirited pianists – dedicated to his art, and nothing soloist Ashkar copes well with the fast Pichon deserve a mention for their performance, supported by Il Pomo D’oro else. On this new recording he plays late tempi. The recording is clean, open, and energetic delivery of the score. Here is a under Ricardo Minasi, is a triumph. This masterworks by Schubert, including the well balanced.’ – Record Review / Hi-Fi brilliant recording of a fine young singer, young cellist is one to watch. AM much-loved Impromptus, and Beethoven’s Choice (London) from whom I can’t wait to hear more. AM mighty ‘Hammerklavier’ Sonata, finishing with six impeccable encores by Rameau and Brahms. MOST SESSIONS FREE ALL WELCOME

The Victorian Indigenous Literary Festival 18 – 21 February 2016 www.blakandbright.com.au @blakandbright