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APRIL 2018

The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart by Holly Ringland

Read our review on page 8

Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia edited by Anita Heiss

Read an extract on page 7

BOOKS MUSIC FILM EVENTS

GURRUMUL page 22

BLUE PLANET II JAMILA RIZVI ROBERT HOLLY ANITA HEISS page 21 page 4 HILLMAN RINGLAND page 13 page 8 page 8

CARLTON 309 LYGON ST 9347 6633 KIDS 315 LYGON ST 9341 7730 DONCASTER WESTFIELD DONCASTER, 619 DONCASTER RD 9810 0891 HAWTHORN 701 GLENFERRIE RD 9819 1917 MALVERN 185 GLENFERRIE RD 9509 1952 ST KILDA 112 ACLAND ST 9525 3852 STATE LIBRARY VICTORIA 328 SWANSTON ST 8664 7540 | SEE SHOP OPENING HOURS, BROWSE AND BUY ONLINE AT WWW.READINGS.COM.AU

READINGS MONTHLY 3 April 2018

goers can discover the largest collection of April rare, out-of-print and collectable books in The Women’s Prize for Fiction 2018 longlist 25% off a range of Insight & Berlitz travel Australia, go inside heritage buildings, listen The longlist for the Women’s Prize for guides to live music, watch street performers, try Fiction 2018 has been announced. This Throughout April, we’re offering 25% off News their hand in a Scrabble tournament and prize celebrates the best writing from female a select range of Insight & Berlitz travel visit the Readings bookstall at the Festival. authors around the world. This year’s longlist guides. This offer is exclusively available A weekend pass is $10 for adults, and $5 for includes: H(a)ppy by Nicola Barker; The Idiot at our Carlton and Hawthorn stores secondary school students and children. See by Elif Batuman; Three Things About Elsie by until 30 April. The range includes travel clunesbooktown.com.au for more information. Joanna Cannon; Miss Burma by Charmaine guides, phrase books and city guides for The Stella Prize 2018 shortlist Craig; Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan; locations all around the world. In-stock The Stella Prize shortlist for 2018 has The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock by Imogen items only, while stocks last. Look for the been announced, celebrating Australian 20% off vinyl sale Hermes Gowar; Sight by Jessie Greengrass; orange ‘25% off’ stickers. This offer is not women’s contribution to literature. The six Record Store Day is officially on Saturday Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail available online. books on the 2018 Stella Prize shortlist are: 21 April, but Readings is celebrating all Honeyman; When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree month long, with 20% off all vinyl for the of the Writer as a Young Wife by Meena by Shokoofeh Azar; Terra Nullius by Claire month of April. Handpicked by our music Kandasamy; Elmet by Fiona Mozley; The Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia G. Coleman; The Life to Come by Michelle specialists, our vinyl collection includes Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati This month sees the release of the de Kretser; An Uncertain Grace by Krissy old favourites alongside exciting new Roy; See What I Have Done by Sarah highly anticipated anthology Growing Up Kneen; The Fish Girl by Mirandi Riwoe; and releases. Come on down to chat with our Schmidt; A Boy in Winter by Rachel Seiffert; Aboriginal in Australia edited by Anita Heiss Tracker by Alexis Wright. The prize awards music team in person and complete your Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie; The Trick to (you can read a piece from the collection on $50,000, and both fiction and non-fiction own collection. The sale runs from 1–30 Time by Kit de Waal; Sing, Unburied, Sing by page 7). Readings will donate $2 from every books are eligible for entry. The winner of April 2018 at all Readings shops (except Jesmyn Ward. The shortlist for the Women’s sale of Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia to the 2018 Stella Prize will be announced on Readings Kids and Readings Malvern). Prize for Fiction will be announced on 23 the Indigenous Literacy Foundation, until 31 Thursday 12 April. The offer only applies to vinyl currently April, and the winner on 6 June. May 2018. in stock, and is not available online. Offer excludes all Record Store Day releases. Jewish Book Week The Melbourne Jewish Book Week is running from 3–9 May at the St Kilda Australian Book Review special offer Town Hall. The program features a mix of The Australian Book Review is one of international and local authors including Australia’s foremost publishers of criticism Rachel Kadish, Stefan Merrill Block, on books, art, film, theatre and opera. This Michael Brooks, Bram Presser, Mohammed month, Readings is partnering with ABR Al Samawi, Sarah Krasnostein and many to help celebrate their 40th birthday. Any more. Readings are proud to be the Readings customer who spends $40 or official bookseller at the festival. To view more in any of our shops or online will the full program and book tickets, visit receive the special anniversary edition melbournejewishbookweek.com.au of ABR for free (RRP $12.95). When spending $40 or more in-store, ask at the counter for your free copy of the Clunes Booktown Festival magazine. When spending $40 or more The annual Clunes Booktown Festival is online, simply write ‘ABR’ in the notes field back, on Saturday 5 and Sunday 6 May. during checkout, and we’ll include a copy Headline authors this year include Richard with your package. This special edition of Flanagan, Eddie Ayres, Jaclyn Moriarty, ABR features writing from David Brophy Josephine Wilson, David Ritter and many and Beejay Silcox, and also includes the more. Along with author talks, panel winner of the Calibre Essay Prize. Hurry, discussions and literary luncheons, festival- offer only available while stocks last.

READINGS MONTHLY EDITOR ADVERTISING PRICES AND AVAILABILITY Free, independent monthly newspaper Elke Power Ellen Cregan Please note that all prices and release dates published by Readings Books, Music & Film [email protected] [email protected] in Readings Monthly are correct at time of publication, however prices and release SUBSCRIBE EDITORIAL ASSISTANT GRAPHIC DESIGN dates may change without notice. Special You can subscribe to Readings Monthly Judi Mitchell Cat Matteson price offers apply only for the month in and our e-news by visiting our website: [email protected] colourcode.com.au which they are featured in the Readings readings.com.au/sign-up Monthly. PROOFREADERS FRONT COVER DELIVERY CHARGES FOR Judi Mitchell and Ellen Cregan The April Readings Monthly cover Readings donates 10% of its profits each MAIL-ORDER PURCHASES features artwork from the cover of The year to The Readings Foundation: $5 flat rate for anywhere in Australia KIDS/YA CURATOR Lost Flowers of Alice Hart by Holly readings.com.au/the-readings-foundation Alexa Dretzke Ringland (Fourth Estate). Cover design by DELIVERY CHARGES FOR Hazel Lam, HarperCollins Design Studio ONLINE PURCHASES MUSIC CURATOR with illustrations by Edith Rewa. Read $5 flat rate for anywhere in Australia for Dave Clarke our review of The Lost Flowers of Alice orders under $100. Free delivery on orders Hart on page 8. $100 and over. CLASSICAL MUSIC CURATOR Phil Richards CARTOON Oslo Davis DVDS CURATOR oslodavis.com Lou Fulco

EVENTS CURATOR Chris Gordon 4 EVENTS

April Tuesday 17 April, 6.30pm Monday 23 April, 6pm–9pm Monday 30 April, 6.30pm EVELYN CONLON IN AN EVENING MEAL AT HOT DESK FELLOWSHIP Events CONVERSATION WITH CIBI AWARDS NIGHT TONI JORDAN We are excited to invite you to an exclusive Together the Wheeler Centre and the As part of Dublin’s One City, One Book evening meal at CIBI. One of Melbourne’s Readings Foundation are delighted to Saturday 7 April, 10.30am events we are thrilled to have Irish author best casual Japanese restaurants, CIBI is a welcome the first in-take of Hot Desk Evelyn Conlon joining us to discuss her Collingwood treasure serving home-style Fellows for 2018. Join us as past and KIDS home city, Dublin, with Melbourne author Japanese cooking. The chefs and creators, present participants reflect on the JOANNE CRAWFORD AND Toni Jordan in a conversation chaired Meg and Zenta Tanaka, will chat with us importance of the space and time to write. by Readings’ own Christine Gordon. about their cooking, their cookbook and Readings Carlton, KERRY ANNE JORDINSON Melbourne and Dublin have each been what makes it all work so beautifully. 309 Lygon Street, Carlton (ILLUS.) granted a City of Literature accolade and CIBI, 45 Keele St, Collingwood Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events Join us for the reading of the delightful share a long history of telling tales. If you’re Tickets are $95 per person and include a picture book I Remember, an exquisite looking for inspiration, love Melbourne, delicious meal and a signed copy of the CIBI tale of memory by Joanne Crawford and love Dublin and want to be part of this cookbook. Very limited places, bookings illustrated by Kerry Anne Jordinson. Set in international conversation, join us for a essential at readings.com.au/events the Geraldton area of Western Australia, chat and a bevvy! an elderly woman remembers the camping Readings Carlton, trips of her childhood. 309 Lygon Street, Carlton Monday 23 April, 6.30pm Readings Kids, Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events 315 Lygon Street, Carlton HOLLY RINGLAND IN Free, no booking required. CONVERSATION WITH Thursday 19 April, 6.30pm MYFANWY JONES Monday 9 April, 6.30pm ANITA SELZER IN We are thrilled to have Holly Ringland speaking about her extraordinary debut novel, CONVERSATION WITH The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart, which has ELIZABETH FINKEL & LISA PHILLIPS everyone talking! It spans two decades, and MADELEINE VAN OPPEN We are pleased to have the author of I am is set between sugar-cane fields by the sea, ON SAVING THE GREAT Sasha in conversation with Lisa Phillips, a native Australian flower farm, and a celestial BARRIER REEF the Director of Education for the Jewish crater in the central desert. It follows Alice’s Holocaust Centre. Anita Selzer’s novel unforgettable journey as she learns that the Join Elizabeth Finkel, one of the founders focuses on German-occupied Poland in most powerful story she will ever possess is Monday 30 April, 6.30-7.30pm of science magazine Cosmos, as she and 1942, where young boys are targeted by her own. Ringland will be in conversation with Madeleine van Oppen (chair of marine the Nazis and a remarkable mother takes fellow author Myfanwy Jones. biology at the University of Melbourne STORIES FROM EARLY an ingenious step. To avoid suspicion, she and a senior principal research scientist Readings Carlton, MOTHERHOOD trains her son to be a girl: his clothing, at AIMS, the Australian Institute of Marine 309 Lygon Street, Carlton voice, hair, manners and more. Together, We are thrilled to bring you a panel Science) discuss the new science needed they face incredible odds as their story Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events of women that will not hold back on to save the Great Barrier Reef. Australia is sweeps backwards and forwards across telling it how it is. Based on Jamila exploring ways to rescue the reef ranging occupied Europe. Rizvi’s new book The Motherhood, in from fast breeding programs for genetically which many of Australia’s favourite Tuesday 24 April, 6.30pm tougher corals to installing underwater fans Readings Hawthorn, women share what they wish they’d at tourist sites. 701 Glenferrie Road, Hawthorn known about life with a newborn, join us for the biggest mothers’ group of all Readings Carlton, Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events STUART KELLS & IAN 309 Lygon Street, Carlton GOW ON THE BIG FOUR time with Jamila Rizvi, Clare Bowditch, Kara Keys and Clementine Ford. Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events The Big Four: The Curious Past and Perilous Saturday 21 April, 10.30am Future of the Global Accounting Monopoly by The Melbourne Athenaeum, Ian D. Gow and Stuart Kells discusses the hold 188 Collins Street, Melbourne KIDS the so-called Big Four accounting and audit Friday 13 April, 11am–11.45am $50 per person, includes a signed copy of firms – Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers, SAMMY J The Motherhood. Babes-in-arms welcome. KIDS Ernst & Young, and KPMG – have on our Please book at readings.com.au/events STORY TIME community. Together, these firms earn more GINGER GREEN Sammy J (aka Sam Jonathan McMillan) is than US$100 billion annually and employ HOLIDAY FUN an award-winning comedian, writer and almost one million people. In many profound musician. The Long Class Goodnight is the ways, they have changed how we work, how Join author Kim Kane as she talks about first title in his new middle grade fiction we manage, how we invest and how we are her wonderful, fun and funny Ginger Green series. This is a laugh-out-loud and big- governed. Is this a good thing? Join us for a series of books (she may even read from Coming hearted story about finding your place and lively discussion as we try to envision how and one!) and, in celebration of it being a VERY taking control of circumstances – rather why this has happened. spooky day, teaches us all to make slime. than accepting what people say about you. Up Readings Hawthorn, Readings Hawthorn, This event is suitable for ages 7–12. 701 Glenferrie Road, Hawthorn 701 Glenferrie Road, Hawthorn Readings Kids, Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events Tickets are $10 per child and include one copy 315 Lygon Street, Carlton of a Ginger Green book and slime workshop. Monday 7 May, 6.30pm Suitable for Prep to Grade 3. Limited places, Free, no booking required. bookings essential at readings.com.au/events Saturday 28 April, 2pm THE BOOKSHOP OF THE BROKEN HEARTED Monday 23 April, 6.30pm ALEXIS WRIGHT IN Saturday 14 April, 10.30am CONVERSATION WITH Join us for the launch of The Bookshop of TALKING ABOUT THE the Broken Hearted, a tremendous novel KIDS MORAG FRASER by Robert Hillman that acknowledges that STELLA PRIZE FOUND IN MELBOURNE Tracker is award-winning author Alexis sometimes we have no control over history We are delighted to be joined by one of Wright’s first work of nonfiction since 1997’s but we do have some control over how we STORY TIME the shortlisted authors for this year’s Grog War, and is a gripping account of live. It is the story of Tom Hope, a farmer, Join author Joanne O’Callaghan as she Stella Prize to talk about her book, charismatic Indigenous leader and activist and Hannah Babel, a quixotic, small-town reads from Found in Melbourne, a story women’s work, and why it’s never done. ‘Tracker’ Tilmouth, a tireless advocate for bookseller who is the second Jewish person of friendship and multicultural community Shokoofeh Azar is the author of The the legal and economic advancement of – and the most vivid person – Tom has ever celebrating Melbourne’s landmarks and Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree, Aboriginal people. We are delighted to met. He dares to believe they could make attractions. It is illustrated by award-winning an extraordinary magical realist novel have Wright discussing her wonderful book each other happy; Tom Hope is taking on a Hong Kong artist Kori Song, and is written set in Iran immediately after the Islamic with Morag Fraser, one of Australia’s most battle with heartbreak he can barely even in both English and Simplified Chinese. Revolution in 1979. experienced literary commentators. begin to imagine.

Readings Kids, Readings Hawthorn, Montsalvat, 7 Hillcrest Ave, Eltham Readings Carlton, 315 Lygon Street, Carlton 701 Glenferrie Road, Hawthorn 309 Lygon Street, Carlton Tickets are $20 per person and include afternoon Free, no booking required. Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events tea. Please book with Montsalvat on 9439 7712. Free, but please book at readings.com.au/events EVENTS READINGS MONTHLY 5 April 2018

Sympath by Carolyn Denman Second World War on northern Australia. Bono by Helen Brown Sunday 27 May, 2.30pm Join us for the launch of Carolyn Denman’s Wednesday 18 April, 6.30pm Based on Helen Brown’s enormously Sympath, the third instalment in The Sentinels Readings Carlton | Free, no booking required. popular Huffington Post blog, Bono: The of Eden series. It is a paranormal Australian Rescue Cat Who Helped Me Find My Way SARAH FERGUSON IN William McInnes launches Mira fantasy, gently woven through with Christian Home tells Brown’s poignant story of big life Robertson’s debut novel CONVERSATION and Indigenous spiritual themes, all rolled into changes. After a brush with cancer, Helen Join William McInnes as he launches award- Join award-winning ABC journalist Sarah a good Aussie-style adventure in which the Brown – happily married for 22 years and winning screenwriter Mira Robertson’s debut Ferguson (The Killing Season; Hitting Home) Garden of Eden has been moved and hidden with three grown children – took stock of novel, The Unexpected Education of Emily for a discussion about her new book, on a sheep station in north-western Victoria. her comfortable suburban life and found Dean. In 1944 Emily Dean is dispatched from On Mother, a reflection on mothers and it wanting. Seizing the day, she headed to Tuesday 10 April, 6.30pm Melbourne to stay with her father’s relatives daughters. The sudden death of Ferguson’s Readings Hawthorn | Free, no booking required. New York, the city that never sleeps, where in rural Victoria. At the family property her mother revealed their relationship with she was talked into fostering a rescue cat. You Belong Here by Laurie Steed grandmother is determined to keep up poignant clarity and showed her the Thursday 26 April, 6.30pm Melanie Cheng will launch Laurie Steed’s standards despite the war, her young aunt individual who existed beyond motherhood. Readings Carlton | Free, no booking required. new novel, You Belong Here. This is a raw, at refuses to befriend her, and Emily can’t wait Cinema Nova, times heartbreaking, but ultimately hopeful to go home. This is a delightfully wry novel What You Might Find by Richard Holt 380 Lygon Street, Carlton meditation on what it means to be a family about desire, deceit and self-discovery. Straight from the Newcastle Writers Tickets are $45 per person and include a signed in modern Australia. Thursday 19 April, 6.30pm Festival, join us for the launch of Richard copy of On Mother, afternoon tea from Brunetti Tuesday 10 April, 6.30pm Readings Carlton | Free, no booking required. Holt’s debut short-story collection, What and a glass of champagne. Please book at Readings Carlton | Free, no booking required. You Might Find. Richard Holt’s stories are A White Hot Flame by Sue Taffe readings.com.au/events truly addictive: perfectly formed, funny and Pink Mountain on Locust Island by Jamie Join us for a celebration of Sue Taffe’s new tragic glimpses under the surface of life. Marina Lau book, A White Hot Flame. It explores the life Thursday 26 April, 6.30pm Join us for the launch of an unpredictable of Mary Montgomerie Bennett (1881–1961), Readings St Kilda | Free, no booking required. Tuesday 10 July, 4:30pm and innovative debut novel from a an important but under-recognised figure in provocative new voice in Australian fiction. Australian history. A member of a successful Barry Marshall with Lorna Hendry and INTRODUCING THE Jamie Marina Lau’s Pink Mountain on squatting family, from her late forties until Bernard Caleo (illus.) Locust Island embraces the noir tradition her death she fought for justice on behalf of Join us for the release of How to Win a Nobel 104-STOREY TREEHOUSE and features a prose style quite unlike any First Australians. She was a teacher, writer, Prize by Nobel Prize-winner Barry Marshall We’re delighted to invite everyone along to before, tackling everything from modernity advocate, and a voice for reform. with Lorna Hendry and illustrated by Bernard another utterly madcap book launch with to adolescence to religion to brown couches. Thursday 19 April, 6.30pm Caleo. This is a time-travel adventure for Andy Griffiths and Terry Denton. Wednesday 11 April, 6.30pm Readings St Kilda | Free, no booking required. budding young scientists (it includes real The 104-Storey Treehouse is a brand-new, Readings Carlton | Free, no booking required. experiments for school and home!) that brilliantly wacky treehouse adventure. Cath Crowley launches Clare Strahan’s follows Mary as she seeks to become a real Jason Steger launches Making a Meal of novel Andy and Terry have added another scientist and win the greatest prize of all. It by Brian McFarlane Join Cath Crowley as she launches Clare 13 levels to their magnificent creation, Thursday 26 April, 6.00pm Jason Steger will launch Brian Strahan’s novel, The Learning Curves of complete with a never-ending staircase Readings Kids | Free, no booking required. McFarlane’s first-rate resource for film Vanessa Partridge. At the end of the school and a burp bank – finally! buffs, Making a Meal of It. This selection year, fifteen-year-old high-achieving ‘good Stone Girl by Eleni Hale Andy and Terry promise to deliver one of McFarlane’s writings on film, taken girl’ Vanessa Partridge re-invents herself Join us for the release of Eleni Hale’s stunning hour of complete and total madness at this as a whole, tells a story about what has and seeks out new life experiences as she and unforgettable debut YA novel, Stone Girl. book’s launch. brought us back to the cinema again and asserts her independence. A wonderful and Compelling, involving and beautifully written, again, from recent times to a now more Melbourne Town Hall, funny coming-of-age story set at the beach Stone Girl is the powerful and moving story of 90-130 Swanston Street, Melbourne distant past. In his attuned but easy style over the summer holidays. Sophie, who becomes a ward of the state. the guide will bring back memories, as $28 per person, includes a signed first edition Tuesday 24 April, 6.30pm Thursday 3 May, 6.30pm well as fills gaps in our knowledge. of The 104-Storey Treehouse, which will be Readings Carlton | Free, no booking required. Readings St Kilda | Free, no booking required. given out at the event. One ticket is required Wednesday 11 April, 6.30pm per person so adults and children each need a Readings Hawthorn | Free, no booking required. ticket. $1.50 from each ticket will be donated to Andrea Goldsmith launches The Worry the Indigenous Literacy Foundation. Please book Front by H.C. Gildfind at readings.com.au/events Andrea Goldsmith will launch H.C. Gildfind’s Queenscliffe Literary Festival short-story collection, The Worry Front. This each weekend in May. collection explores themes of medicalisation of the human body, familial and sexual The festival welcomes Keynote Speakers April relationships, animal relationships, and male John Bell and Robert Dessaix and female struggles against gendered social roles and attitudes. Conversations, Writing Workshops and Special Events Launches Thursday 12 April, 6.30pm Readings Carlton | Free, no booking required. Some highlights:

My Ikaria by Spiri Tsintziras SAT MAY 5TH SAT MAY 12TH SAT MAY 19TH SUN MAY 20TH Join Melbourne’s own Spiri Tsintziras for the Keynote John Bell Miles Franklin YA Writing Workshop ‘A Camino Mine by Susi Fox shares ‘My Life award-winners with Gold Inky Experience’ with We are delighted to celebrate Susi Fox’s launch of her heart-warming memoir, My in Shakespeare’ Josephine Wilson award-winner Cath Graeme Simsion and debut novel. Mine is the story of a GP who Ikaria. It includes delicious family recipes and Sofie Laguna Crowley and editor Anne Buist SUN MAY 6TH and will console and entertain all who are Alison Arnold has her first baby prematurely. When she Keynote Robert SUN MAY 13TH SAT MAY 26TH sees him, in shock after the trauma, she is bogged down in the daily grind, encouraging Dessaix speaks on his Hugh White discusses SAT MAY 19TH ‘Travel New York’ adamant that he is not hers. No-one believes us to put our health and happiness first. travels in ‘A Writer’s his Quarterly Essay Foreign with Stella-winner Walk Around ‘Without America: Correspondence with Heather Rose and Thursday 12 April, 6.30pm her, and she must fight against perceptions the World’ Australia in the Michael Brissenden, Alexandra Carroll of madness to find her real baby. Readings Hawthorn | Free, no booking required. New Asia’ Hugh Riminton SAT MAY 12TH Thursday 5 April, 6.30pm and Professor Small Spaces by Sarah Epstein Ross McMullin on THURS MAY 17TH Damien Kingsbury Readings Carton | Free, no booking required. Join us for the exciting release of the ‘Pompey Elliott Death Over Dinner at War’ with Ailsa Piper, Leah Tony Birch launches Relatively Famous psychological thriller Small Spaces by Kaminsky and by Roger Averill Sarah Epstein. Fleur Ferris will be asking Caroline Baum Join us for the launch of Roger Averill’s the hard questions of Epstein on the night. Relatively Famous. This entertaining new Small Spaces is the story of Tash and novel, to be launched by Tony Birch, Mallory, whose lives were changed in their explores the world of a son living in the childhood when Tash’s then-imaginary shadow of his Booker Prize-winning father. friend, Sparrow, lured Mallory away from a Saturday 7 April, 3pm carnival and she went missing for a week. Readings Hawthorn | Free, no booking required. Now, Mallory is 15 and mute, and Tash thinks Sparrow is back. A Head-Heart Start for Life: Creative, Friday 13 April, 6pm Mindful Discoveries for Children by Janet Etty-Leal Readings St Kilda | Free, no booking required. Please join us to celebrate the release of Lucy Treloar launches Two Generations Janet Etty-Leal’s second book, A Head- by Anne Connor MAY 4TH - 27TH Heart Start for Life: Creative, Mindful Join Anne Connor as her book Two queenscliffeliteraryfestival.com.au Discoveries for Children. Janet Etty-Leal Generations is launched by Lucy Treloar. www.facebook.com/queenscliffeliteraryfestival is a mindfulness consultant for Geelong Based on a true story and weaving a tale Grammar School, helping lead the school’s of romance, hardship and resilience, Two embedded mindfulness programme. Generations is an intimate and imaginative Monday 9 April, 6.30pm retelling of the lasting effect of secrets Readings Hawthorn | Free, no booking required. on a family, and the greater impact of the 6 Mark’s Dear Discover a new favourite Say Reader

After a hiatus of almost 18 Anita Heiss has edited A Scandal in Bohemia years, this month marks our Nonfiction Book of Gideon Haigh the publication of Issue the Month, Growing up An unsolved murder takes 66 of the journal Australian Aboriginal in Australia, one of Australia’s foremost writers of non-fiction into Short Stories ($19.95). The an essential and the 1930s Bohemian first edition of ASS was published at generous collection that our reviewer demi-monde, exploring the Christmas in 1982 and sported a great cover calls nothing short of ‘brilliant’; this fate of a talented young woman in a ‘liberated’ world. by Michael Leunig and contributors included book gives voice to the variety of David Ireland, Frank Hardy, Manning Indigenous experience and should be Macbeth Clark, and Barry Dickins. Bruce and Lynn compulsory reading across the land. Jo Nesbo loved publishing ASS, however it wasn’t Please obtain this book immediately (and Set in a dark, rainy northern town, Nesbo’s Macbeth pits viable and the last issue came out in 2000. help raise money for the ILF as well). The the ambitions of a corrupt Following its publication in 2014, title alone of our Fiction Book of the policeman against loyal Month, Robert Hillman’s novel, The colleagues, a drug-depraved Pascoe’s book Dark Emu went on to win a underworld and the pull of number of awards. Pascoe felt he should Bookshop of the Broken Hearted, should childhood friendships. use some of this prize money to revive ASS. be enough to win you over (heartbreak and bookshops – what more romance can “For eternal loyalty is inhuman Pascoe and Harwood felt that there were still so many writers out there who aren’t a bibliophile need?), but if you require and betrayal is human.” being read. They also felt that to truly reflect further encouragement, our reviewer JO NESBO Australian culture more space needs to be tells you that ‘it doesn’t get better’ for her MACBETH given to Aboriginal writers. The new issue than this book; this is such an enjoyable Fearless Frederic includes all new stories by Kim Scott, Carmel novel, and I predict that you and all your Felice Arena Bird, Barry Dickins and Archie Weller. friends will soon be debating who should A story of friendship and star in the mini-series. heart-racing adventure Another milestone this month is – a perfect follow up to the publication of the 400th issue of April also brings us Holly Ringland’s the acclaimed The Boy Australian Book Review. ABR was started in debut, The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart, and the Spy. Adelaide by Geoffrey Dutton, Max Harris a book sure to capture botanical One and Rosemary Wighton. Many years ago imaginations everywhere: our reviewer Andrew Hutchinson I succeeded the late Brian Johns, the loved it. Brow Books has another One probes the extremes we former head of the ABC, as chair of ABR’s discovery, local wunderkind Jamie go to for love; the extent of emotional influence; the scars editorial board. They were big shoes to fill Marina Lau’s debut, Pink Mountain on we leave on each other. but it was an interesting time and everyone Locust Island. Also out this month are involved was proud of the magazine that new novels from Gail Jones, Rodney was recording the renaissance of Australian Hall, Andrew Hutchinson, S.A. Jones, Read more at penguin.com.au writing. Acclaimed writer and poet Peter Roger Averill and Jenny Ackland, and the Rose has been editor since 2001; he’s collected stories of Gerald Murnane. Top justifiably proud of the 400th issue which of my international fiction wishlist is The includes special commemorative features, Mars Room by Rachel Kushner, but yours the winning essay for the 2017 Calibre might be the new work from Raymond Prize, an article by Beejay Silcox (ABR E. Feist, Sally Vickers, Mario Vargas Fortieth Birthday Fellow) and contributions Llosa, Donal Ryan, Jo Nesbo, Richard by many senior writers and critics Powers, Négar Djavadi, Madeline Miller, long associated with ABR. ABR is also Lisa Genova, Charles Frazier, or Frances announcing an increase to its payments Mayes. Joseph Cassara’s hyped debut to writers and to its already impressive about the New York voguing scene of the support for Australian literature. 1980s, The House of Impossible Beauties, To celebrate this milestone, Readings is out this month too, as is Asymmetry, an will be giving a copy of the 400th issue to impressive first novel by Lisa Halliday. customers spending $40 and over – just ask Readers of memoir should take note of A your Readings bookseller. If you are buying Certain Light, journalist Cynthia Banham’s online just write ‘ABR’ in the notes field and impossible personal story of recovery we’ll include the magazine in your parcel. following a plane crash. Publishers, please Included in each issue will be a special keep bringing us books about climate subscription offer for Readings customers. change so that future generations can Late last year the Indigenous know that people did care that this was Literacy Foundation decided to expand happening: Sunburnt Country and A History its early literacy program to 30 remote of the World in Seven Cheap Things each communities in Australia. Initial research provide analyses of the journey to this stage conducted by Rohan Shinkfield in of climate crisis. Meanwhile, the global Warburton, Western Australia, showed influence of accounting firms is the subject that the BookBuzz program increased the of The Big Four; Everyday Sexism founder children’s engagement with books by up Laura Bates has a new essay collection, to 100%. Engagement with books is an Misogynation; Alberto Manguel echoes essential precursor to lifetime learning. Walter Benjamin’s famous essay – but in The ILF’s BookBuzz program provides reverse – with Packing My Library; David communities with the resources to have McKnight hopes for a progressive form of a significant impact on early childhood populism with Populism Now!; Jennifer literacy. These include a booklet and Palmieri inspires a new generation of female DVD outlining effective ways to run the leaders with Dear Madam President. program, a range of board books in English And finally, dear reader, the book I’ve or local language, reading mats and a box most been looking forward to reading to pack everything up. If you feel inspired this year is Stephanie Bishop’s Man Out of and want to help, just $400 is enough to Time. Hachette heeded my desperate plea set up one playgroup. Readings is donating in the February RM, and sent me a proof $2 from the sale of every copy of Black via express post (thanks to our rep Mary!). Inc.’s anthology Growing Up Aboriginal in I read it immediately. This follow up to Australia edited by Anita Heiss ($29.99, see 2015’s impeccable Readings Prize-winning extract on page 7 and review on page 13). The Other Side of the World is sublime. I www.panmacmillan.com.au You can top this up by donating online at can’t wait to write a full review and have it indigenousliteracyfoundation.org.au. on our shelves in September. NEW AUSTRALIAN WRITING 7

Growing Up backyard, hundreds of metres away, ‘Kyrrah, Zack, DINNER maybe build a fantasy life in my head. Aboriginal in Australia TIME!’ We would ignore the first call but the second one I didn’t know how to respond so I left the house and Anita Heiss (ed.) we would definitelyanswer, otherwise Mum would walk to went home. I was pissed off. How could my best friend do Black Inc. PB. $29.99 the park herself and we would all cop it. All the kids were nothing to prevent this? How could she just sit there and not scared of my mum. She is an unapologetically black woman get mad on my behalf too? Who the fuck was this person I Readings will donate $2 from every sale of Growing Up Aboriginal in with all that alludes to. She embarrassed us deeply. I wished called my best friend? Australia to the Indigenous Literacy she was less aggressive and more gentle in order to get more When I got home and explained to my parents what Foundation until 31 May 2018. white kids to play with me. No white parent understood her had happened, they seemed well versed in this exact defiance. Every black parent did. experience. My dad rolled his eyes and patted me on My mother is Indigenous, and my father is Polish. He the back while explaining to me that my friend and her drove taxis, and she was an artist. I had always noticed boyfriend weren’t trying to hurt me. ‘It’s common for white the way that people looked at them: my mum – a visibly people to think that way. They think the goal is to look less black woman with her dark hair, dark eyes, dark skin and Indigenous and appear white.’ It was not a good enough even darker beliefs about the world – paired with a very answer for my angry ears, but his logic was flawless; it white man who had blue eyes and blond hair and who can also be applied to my being gay: people had often told was very passive. Sometimes people would ask how they me, ‘You’re not one of those gays, though’, as if that were a ‘ended up’ together, as if she was a last resort and somehow compliment too. trapped him. ‘That’s the story white people predict,’ my Later I got a text from my best friend, who turned out grandmother would eventually tell me as an adult. ‘They to be angry at me for creating a ‘scene’. She told me I was don’t see us as beautiful – they’re trained not to.’ a drama queen and was overreacting. And that wasn’t the When my mother told me I was black, after me first time or the last time I heard such comments when it repeating the Abo joke I heard at school, she explained comes to experiences like that one. Suddenly becoming that that some people would just hate me because of the colour other Indigenous guy in high school seemed reasonable, the of my skin. My grandmother chimed in with, ‘Well, now one who made Abo jokes along with white people; it seemed you know’, as if it were a secret they’d resisted telling me. easier. I understood it more and more with every comment I knew it wasn’t a secret and I realise now that they must about my blackness that I wasn’t permitted to speak about have wondered how long they could hold off addressing it. or react to. They’d predicted that a nice white area would mean a ten- I forgave my friend for not reacting or defending me, year delay. I’m sorry that Shawn took that away from them. and I apologised for overreacting. We aren’t friends today, I didn’t believe my mother when she told me that but back then I was very desperate to keep the friends I people would dislike me because of the colour of my skin. had, so I often apologised even though I didn’t know what It seemed so outrageous to my seven-year-old brain. I got I was sorry for. Was I sorry for being black? Maybe. I sure angry and stormed out of the room, but she was right. I acted like it was worth being ashamed of. I was most sorry don’t remember the joke but I remembered the word ‘Abo’. for myself that this was what I had to endure just to keep By sixteen I would friends. Friends that I realised weren’t worth it in the end. wear sunscreen My identity was assembling. religiously and avoid I don’t speak to anybody I used to know from high going into direct sunlight school now. Evading situations is still deemed as a scene to keep my skin as pale to people. There will never be a correct way to react in as possible. I was only their eyes unless it’s me saying, ‘I’m sorry.’ I’m tired Growing Up half black so was lucky to of being sorry that I exist. I know I make white people be able to be mistaken for uncomfortable. I’m uncomfortable around them too. I know Italian. I wouldn’t walk that you have to think about the way you speak, and it’s Aboriginal in around barefoot. I would like treading on eggshells to be ‘normal’ around me, but never wear trackpants this is not my fault. It isn’t entirely your fault either. This outside of the house and is how we’ve set up racism in Australia: where you think Australia I would pretend to be it’s okay to make race-based jokes, and I get called a drama lost if I ever had to set queen if I dare react to anything you say. I question myself foot inside Centrelink every time something like that happens and wonder if my (‘but while I’m here you reactions are appropriate. I worry more about how you take may as well give me the forms to fill out’). During the course my reaction than I do about my own feelings. I’m used to Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia is an important of high school I had heard every Abo joke ever to exist; I had questioning myself – it’s almost a sport. new anthology edited by Anita Heiss. From well- also been told I was a faggot because it was spray-painted on There are still parts of me that are afraid of white known and new voices, Heiss has brought together school property somewhere. That’s about when I realised I Australians. I bought an Aboriginal flag t-shirt and I’ve a compelling range of experiences and perspectives was queer. Thanks, random graffiti wall! never worn it in public yet. I intend to, but for now I’m too in this collection. ‘Abo Nose’ by Zachary Penrith- Other than me and my sister, there were two or three worried it’ll attract negative attention and commentary other Indigenous kids at my high school. One of the other from strangers. This is similar to the reasons why I don’t Puchalski is one such account. Indigenous boys would actively encourage Abo jokes, leave the house on Invasion Day: I know somebody will and would tell some himself. I couldn’t imagine doing identify me as Aboriginal and want to tell me something. I I am Koori – my tribe is Yorta Yorta. something like that, and it made me feel he was beneath don’t owe you an explanation for my existence. I didn’t know I was black till I was seven years old. I me, till I realised he was just trying to fit in. He was Identity is a strong word when you’ve had to fight hard didn’t know that people would eventually cross the street applying sunscreen with his words, reducing the cost of to keep one. It took years of questioning myself to get to to avoid walking on the same path as me. I didn’t know that being black by engaging in the jokes. He was doing the who I am now – I can’t let it go. I’m stubborn like my mother people would define me as ‘not looking that Aboriginal’, as same as I was but with different tools. now. The qualities that my mother had that used to be if it were a compliment. I never foresaw that people would It’s rough to be Aboriginal and proud and stick up for embarrassing are now the qualities I admire in myself. think they understood my story before they heard a word yourself when it means having no friends at all. All white Unapologetically black is where I want to be, but just black pass through my lips. people in my school would laugh at every Abo joke they ever and questioning myself every now and then is a progression My mum and dad would tell me how I believed Mum heard while simultaneously being nice to me. I engaged from who I used to be. was chocolate, Dad was vanilla and I was caramel. Me and with racist jokes about other cultures in the hopes it would I go into the sun a lot without sunscreen now. I enjoy my sister were half-Koori and half-Polish – black Poles, as prevent them talking about mine. every shade my skin has to offer. I’m twenty-six years old, my mum and dad lovingly referred to us. By the age of seventeen I had made a solid group of and I walk to the milkbar down the street barefoot, in A boy named Shawn told an Abo joke while we were in friends, yet I never stopped having to deal with racism trackpants. That’s the furthest I’ve gone. For now. Italian class in primary school. I laughed along with the about my Aboriginality – and then I’d have to decide joke because I didn’t know what that word meant and I how to react. Consider the occasion when I met my best didn’t want to appear stupid. I had never heard that word friend’s new boyfriend for the first time. We were all Zachary Penrith-Puchalski was born in 1990 and is before so I eventually asked my teacher what it meant and looking at photos of a girl we went to high school with, and from the Yorta Yorta and Dja Dja Wurrung tribes. she became agitated; she scolded him and threatened him, her boyfriend said, ‘She has an Abo nose.’ I could feel the His grandfather, Burnum Burnum, was an but still I never knew what this word ‘Abo’ meant. tension. He realised he’d said something terrible – and I Indigenous rights activist best known for planting the Aboriginal flag on the White Cliffs of Dover in I grew up in a very affluent area where there were realised he was attacking my identity. One of us had to react England in 1988. Zachary currently lives in white people with million-dollar houses. I grew up in the eventually, right? I could tell my best friend wasn’t so much Melbourne and studies criminology and psychology at RMIT University, smallest house on my street. Commission houses with red pissed off at what her boyfriend had said as concerned and plans to work in the justice and community services sector. He has bricks: everybody knew the red-brick houses meant you about how I would react. ‘You don’t have an Abo nose,’ the appeared on ABC TV’s You Can’t Ask That and works to support were a poor commission-housing kid. If our tiny house boyfriend quickly exclaimed, as if it were a compliment, as Indigenous and LGBTQIA+ Australians through various organisations, as well as providing workshops on identity for young people. wasn’t obvious enough, the faded second-hand clothes if it exonerated him. To be honest, there was a time where made it clear. I would have taken it as a compliment. There was a time To find out more about the anthology, read our review of Growing Up Me, my sister and the other commission kids formed a when I would encourage this compliment. I’d believed that Aboriginal in Australia on page 13. group and would play at the park till Mum shouted from our between the sunscreen and these ‘compliments’, I could 8 FICTION

such as domestic violence, the cycle of abuse brother is a frequent visitor to the farm. Yet New and land ownership. This is a courageous despite their deeply interconnected lives, and remarkable book that I’m sure many the adults don’t seem to share important readers will connect with. I loved it. things with Olive – except Thistle, but Fiction Olive is learning that while Thistle is Amanda Rayner is from Readings Carlton often the only person who will tell the The Fortress truth in full, she can also be unreliable. When Luke Sands, a bully from a There is a saying in Hungary: You know you’re a Hungarian S.A. Jones notorious local family, tells Olive that when you can’t say anything positive about politics. I live Echo. PB. Was $32.99 BOOK OF THE she had a baby sister who died, Olive is with a Hungarian and this statement is totally accurate. $29.99 MONTH almost consumed by her determination However what it doesn’t say, and what you need to know The Fortress has a to find out what happened and avenge the Fiction as you begin to ponder the wonderful character of Hannah fascinating premise. death of her sister. This is not, however, Babel in The Bookshop of the Broken Hearted, is that Alongside a world that a young adult detective story. Rather, it Hungarians understand and mock politics all the time appears the same as our is the tale of Olive’s search for identity because they have been done over by so many other nations. own, there exists an in her transition to adulthood, and of After World War II and the Hungarian uprising, Hannah all-female civilisation. Its her growing awareness that the world Babel arrives in Australia as a grieving mother and a widow native women are called is not as simple as it once seemed. twice over. She moves to a small town in Victoria and the Vaik. They are proud, Tragedy has visited this family more meets mild, decent and devoted farmer Tom Hope. Hope, Amazonian and powerful; bound by their than once, and throughout the novel it’s of course, has had his fair share of disappointments and own laws, rituals and language. They live impossible to avoid the suspicion that it grief, but he is genuinely unable to comprehend the forces in a fortress which is walled in on three will visit again. These past misfortunes that have governed Babel’s life. It’s simply unfathomable sides, the sea forming a natural barrier on are varied, layered, and revealed for an Australian farmer to understand the depths of the fourth. Entry is through the tightly incrementally as the reader is absorbed fear in a Hungarian Jewish woman in the 1960s. It is patrolled Veya Gate and the future of the in Olive’s mission. Jenny Ackland has clear though that the author, Robert Hillman, does. civilisation is secured through brought a recognisable world to the He has written a precious story here. I read it one reproductive treaties whereby the Vaik are The Bookshop of page and her characters are realised sitting and was enthralled by Hillman’s ability to conjure granted access to men and sperm. the Broken with empathy and catch at the heart. Hearted up all that is country Victoria (the scenery, the gossip In an uncomfortably familiar story, the and the neighbours) alongside all that is Hungarian (the Vaik had inhabited the land for thousands Elke Power is the editor of the Readings Monthly Robert Hillman food, the politics, the heartbreak) and I fell utterly in love of years before colonists arrived and tried to Text. PB. $29.99 with his two main characters. They are my type of people. take over. The resulting treaty between the The Art of Persuasion Surely they have been created to represent some sort indigenous inhabitants and the invading Susan Midalia of truth about our country. Certainly, I found that the novel beautifully represents settlers included conditions and clauses FACP. PB. $24.99 Hillman’s inherent understanding of Australia and its people. This is a novel of shaped by generations of Vaik tradition. For Twenty-five-year-old Hazel desolation, and it is, ultimately, a love story. Frankly, for me, it doesn’t get better. instance, female victims of male violence is reading the classics, Chris Gordon is the events manager for Readings in the ‘new’ world can order their assailants starting with ‘A’. It’s one exiled to the fortress indefinitely. Once there, way to pass the time when women have the power of life and death you’ve quit your job and over them. Men can also enter the fortress lost your way. But then she Australian Fiction The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart as supplicants – asking to be redeemed, has a chance encounter Holly Ringland restored or perhaps even reinvented. with an irresistible older man. When Hazel Fourth Estate. PB. Was $32.99 Jonathon Bridge, a privileged white is partnered with him on a political $29.99 man, is sent into the fortress for a year campaign, her attraction is deepened by The Death of Noah Glass by his pregnant wife after she discovers the strength of his convictions. Adam The challenge with Gail Jones that not only has he participated in sexual seems to be attracted to her too – but why reviewing The Lost Text. PB. Was $29.99 misconduct at his top-tier firm, but also is he resisting? And what does Jane Austen Flowers of Alice Hart by facilitated a cover-up. Again, it’s an have to teach a young woman about life, $26.99 Holly Ringland is to convey uncomfortably familiar story – Jonathon love and literature in the 21st century? ‘Mattanza’ is a in only a few hundred is so habituated to misogyny that he hasn’t Sicilian word to words the stunning the faintest idea what gender parity might describe a seasonal ritual achievement of this debut Collected Short Fiction even mean. His sense of self-entitlement of hunting and killing author. Ringland has Gerald Murnane is monumental; thus, his induction tuna in the waters around written a heartbreaking yet hopeful work Giramondo. PB. $34.95 into an all-female civilisation where Sicily; it also the term used about trauma, healing and self-discovery This is the definitive women hold the power, including sexual to describe periodic mafia worthy of sitting alongside novels such as The collection of the short power, is deeply satisfying. The ways in killings. Noah Glass, an Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd and She’s fiction of an Australian which Jonathan changes are perhaps art historian, travels to Sicily and shortly Come Undone by Wally Lamb. master-storyteller in a predictable, but the glimpses of a world after arriving he begins an affair with Dora The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart charts league of his own, released in which male submission is normal, Caselli, a colleague from the University of approximately twenty years in the life simultaneously with Farrar together with speculative scenarios Palermo. Dora’s father and three brothers of Alice from nine years old and takes Straus Giroux’s new showing how that might actually work, had all been victims of the Mafia. us through three distinct Australian editions of Border Districts and Collected make for stimulating discussion starters. Shortly after his return from Sicily, Noah landscapes: the seaside, the farm and the Short Fiction in New York. This volume Glass is found by his neighbour floating in central Australian desert. Throughout this Hilary Simmons is from Readings Carlton brings together Gerald Murnane’s shorter the swimming pool of his Sydney apartment odyssey, tragedies occur and secrets are works of fiction, most of which have been block, dead of a heart attack. His two adult revealed as Alice is exposed to the power Little Gods out of print for the past 25 years. It children, Evie, a bookseller from Melbourne, and influence of family, friendship and love Jenny Ackland includes such masterpieces as ‘When the and Martin, a highly regarded Sydney artist, and the way to communicate it all through A&U. PB. Was $29.99 Mice Failed to Arrive’, ‘Stream System’, are devastated by the death of their beloved the language of native Australian flowers. $26.99 ‘First Love’, ‘Emerald Blue’, and ‘The father. They are also shocked when they On every level, The Lost Flowers of Alice Olive Lovelock is Interior of Gaaldine’. called to a police station and questioned Hart is impressive. In telling the story of curious, independent, about Noah’s role in the theft, in Sicily, of Alice, we are also told the stories of many and beguiling. She is The Earth Does Not Get Fat a piece by the sculptor Vincenzo Ragusa. women from Alice’s past and present growing up between her Julia Prendergast Evie and Martin react differently; and the portrayal of these vivid, complex parents’ home in a small UWA Publishing. PB. $24.99 impetuously, Martin decides that he has to characters is one of the highlights of the town in the Mallee and her Chelsea doesn’t attend school go to Sicily to discover what happened to book (there are even three dogs that are cousins’ farm, a (long) bike much any more. She is carer their father there. For Evie, the death of her distinct characters in themselves). The ride away. For Olive, Grade for her mother, who is sinking father brings back the death of her mother settings are stunning and important; water 6 is becoming less enjoyable by the day – further into depression after a when she was very young; she didn’t mourn and fire are recurring motifs symbolic of there are rivalries, tensions, and troubling trauma, and her Grandad, her mother in the way she intensely mourns cleansing, renewal and destruction. Then assumptions – but the summer holidays are who has slipped into full- her father now. Arriving in Sicily, Martin is there is the language; the prose is descriptive coming, and she has her best friend, Peter, blown dementia. Her father is drawn into a world of veiled malevolence and poetic resulting in evocative imagery and three cousins for company and long gone; others are shadowy memories – and secrets as he attempts to reconstruct rich in colour and shade and conveying a adventures. There is also the joy of their intangible like dreams. Then a parcel arrives, his father’s movements there. The Death of strong sense of place. I lost count of the rescue ‘Australian raven’/crow, Grace. full of questions – about her mother and her Noah Glass is a superb novel full of sadness number of times I gasped or nodded my Olive’s family is close – her mother and past self, their shared histories, and the and mystery. It further confirms Gail Jones’ head at a phrase or image as I read this aunt married two of the three Lovelock people and place from which they’ve run. reputation as one of our great writers. book. Finally, there is the story itself which brothers; her third aunt, Thistle, lives with This is a gut-wrenching debut about intense Mark Rubbo is the managing director of Readings explores many relevant and topical themes the other; and the remaining Lovelock suffering and love – fierce, searing love. FICTION READINGS MONTHLY 9 April 2018

One her husband lied to the wrong people. John has written an entertaining, provocative and of Side B, as Kimia – a sound engineer – Andrew Hutchinson Philip’s life has been ruined by too much structurally innovative novel told in three mentions is sometimes the case, that Vintage. PB. Was $32.99 money, then he receives a surprise parts. ‘Folly’ tells the tale of Alice, a twenty- the emotional weight of so many voices $29.99 inheritance. A new novel from Rodney Hall, something woman working in publishing and the singular experience of Kimia He had his heart broken by twice winner of the Miles Franklin Literary who begins a relationship with a famous and settle into a truly satisfying whole. his one true love, and cannot Award, about people experiencing a period much older male novelist, Ezra Blazer. Marie Matteson is from Readings Carlton see a way forward in life. of life they never thought possible. ‘Madness’ takes us to the interrogation room Having alienated himself at Heathrow Airport as Amar, an Iraqi- Macbeth from his family and friends, The Unexpected Education of American economist, tries to transit through Jo Nesbo the UK on his way to visit family in he works nights and shuns Emily Dean Hogarth. PB. Was $32.99 Kurdistan. The final and briefest section, normal society. But not even Mira Robertson $27.99 Black Inc. PB. $29.99 entitled ‘Ezra Blazer’s Desert Island Discs’, disrupted sleep and depression can explain Crime fiction and transcribes a radio interview with the the strange behaviours that will suddenly In 1944 Emily Dean is thrillers aren’t my aforementioned author. take over him. It all escalates on a normal dispatched from Melbourne preferred reading, so I’ve How these three elements are connected night, when he returns home to find a to stay with her father’s never been tempted to is key to the originality and brilliance of this woman asleep in his driveway. Waiting. One relatives in rural Victoria. read a Jo Nesbo novel novel, and I don’t want to spoil the discovery probes the extremes we go to for love. Emily’s grandmother is before. This would no for you, dear reader. Moreover, since I read determined to keep up doubt have remained the an advance copy of this book well before Pink Mountain on Locust Island standards despite the war, case had I not been reviews and author interviews began to Jamie Marina Lau while her young aunt refuses to befriend curious to see how he would retell my appear, I will also refrain from telling you a Brow Books. PB. $27.99 her. Lonely and isolated, Emily can’t wait to favourite Shakespeare play, Macbeth. go home. But things improve when she fact about the novel that I only discovered An unpredictable and Nesbo sets his story in Inverness, making encounters Claudio, the Italian prisoner of after I read it, which made me think again innovative debut novel it sound almost like a Scottish version of war employed as a farm labourer, and when (and again and again) about what I had read from a provocative new Gotham City. In Nesbo’s Inverness, bike her uncle William returns home wounded. (if you can’t bear that teaser, there is much voice in Australian fiction. gangs, drug lords and corrupt police rule. He’s rude, traumatised and mostly drunk, to examine online about this novel, but try Embracing the noir Nobody knows who to trust. There are yet a passion for literature soon draws them to resist and enhance your experience). tradition and featuring a some good guys, though. The story opens together. A delightfully wry novel about Halliday is funny and clever and incisive prose style quite unlike any with the appointment of a new Chief desire, deceit and self-discovery. in her analysis of these everyday experiences before, with references that will go both Commissioner, Duncan, one of the new of asymmetry, playing with notions of over your head and under your feet, Pink generation who support ‘the fight against power and empowerment, free will and Mountain on Locust Island will flip readers Watermark corruption’. Macbeth, at this stage, is head control. She also challenges assumptions upside down and turn your understanding Joanna Atherfold Finn of SWAT. When he and his team swoop in about what a novel is and what it can do – of the world around. It tackles everything S&S. PB. $32.99 to sort out a drug bust that has gone wrong, not in homage to that masculine tradition from modernity, art, family, gender, drugs, Watermark cracks open the Macbeth becomes the hero of the day. in which, quite frankly, an author like Ezra music, adolescence, business, religion, coastal idyll of a Shortly afterwards, Macbeth learns Blazer might wish to reside, but in a way internet cafes, food, strangers, aesthetics, quintessentially Australian from three prostitutes that he has been so unexpected as to provide a supremely vacations, fashion, desires, dreams and seaside landscape to reveal appointed as head of Organised Crime. effective critique of our times and our role as expectations to brown couches. fractured relationships, and They also predict he will one day rule as reading subjects. Read this book now to get innocence lost against a Chief Commissioner. Encouraged by his ahead of the curve, because I feel sure we’ll backdrop that is constantly girlfriend, Lady, former prostitute and owner Relatively Famous see it on prize shortlists in the year ahead. Roger Averill changing. Meet a boy with dyslexia who of Inverness Casino, Macbeth sets about Transit Lounge. PB. $29.99 finds the right words in the ocean, a drifter Alison Huber is the head book buyer for removing anyone who stands in the way Readings Michael and Majorie and her son who seek anonymity, only to of his ultimate ambition. As in the original Madigan refuse to be discover the true meaning of home, and a Macbeth, some of the good guys manage interviewed by biographer widower whose dog helps him cope with the Disoriental to elude him. They plan to overthrow Sinclair Hughes for his new aftermath of his wife’s death. The Négar Djavadi Macbeth and the drug lord, Hecate, and book Inside the Lion’s Den: characters cross boundaries in situations Europa. PB. $27.99 to restore law and order to Inverness. that are darkly comical, menacing or The Literary Life of Gilbert You can and will be This is a very clever and very readable chaotic but, ultimately, transformative. Madigan. This is not tempted to read retelling of Macbeth. It has all the elements surprising as Gilbert is Marjorie’s ex-husband Disoriental in one very of the original play and anyone familiar and Michael’s mostly absent, Booker The Lace Weaver long sitting, well, at least with it will have a good idea of what’s Prize-winning author father. How does one Lauren Chater Side A. Yes, Disoriental going to happen next, but not necessarily live in the shadow of a famous relative who S&S. PB. $29.99 keeps you off balance from how it’s going to happen. Whilst I found we never seem to be able to live up to? In a 1941, Estonia. As Stalin’s Red the first page of contents, a some of the action scenes confusing, world increasingly obsessed by fame and Army crushes everything in novel organised as an especially at the start, the story had me celebrity, this engrossing novel explores its path, Katarina and her album. In this structure lies the scope of hooked. It’s a page turner that will appeal what it might mean to live a good life. family survive only because this wonderful first novel from Négar to Nesbo and Shakespeare fans alike. their farm produce is needed Djavadi, a polyphonic tale of one family, the Sharon Peterson is the manager of Readings Stardust & Golden to feed the occupying forces. Sadrs, and the Iran from which they are St Kilda Doug McEachern Fiercely partisan, Katarina exiled. Footnotes, like liner notes, help the UWA Publishing. PB. $24.99 battles to protect her grandmother’s reader keep a foothold in digressions that Circe Mark David visits a nursing precious legacy – the weaving of gossamer layer upon one another as the story of Madeline Miller home in search of a place for lace shawls stitched with intricate patterns Kimia Sadr and her family stretches across Bloomsbury. PB. $29.99 his elderly mother. There, he that tell the stories passed down through 20th century Iran and Europe. Available 10 April generations. Meanwhile, Lydia escapes to encounters the formidable Négar Djavadi is a screenwriter and Ann Patchett calls Estonia from her prison of privilege in Elizabeth Ryder, mother of this story of Kimia Sadr, sitting in a Circe ‘an epic Moscow. Facing the threat of invasion by the his best friend, who he hasn’t waiting room in an IVF clinic in France spanning thousands of Third Reich, Katarina and Lydia and two seen in forty years. The and recounting the last one hundred years years that’s also a idealistic young soldiers find themselves in a meeting catapults Mark back to his student of Iranian history through the stories keep-you-up-all-night fight for life, liberty and love. days in the late 1960s: to Adelaide during the of her family, has a cinematic quality. page turner’. It definitely Vietnam War, when conscription was on As she begins each new tale the scene is had me reading into the everyone’s minds. Stardust and Golden set, Kimia in the drab waiting room fading early hours of the captures the heady days of resistance, of International Fiction into scenes made vivid by their dislocation morning just like her Orange Prize- young lives shaped by a far-off war, and of in time from the present. Instead, we are winning novel, The Song of Achilles. Once music, and abandon. now in a harem in Mazandaran, or sitting again Madeline Miller has created an Asymmetry in an apartment with Kimia’s atheist unforgettable set of vivid characters based A Stolen Season Lisa Halliday parents watching French new wave cinema on ancient myths and legends. Rodney Hall Granta. PB. $27.99 with their neighbours through a jerry You may know our protagonist Circe Picador. PB. $29.99 Given the fact of the rigged VCR. The tension is finely wrought from her role in the famous Homeric Adam’s life has been ruined seemingly relentless as the effect of Kimia’s cascade of stories, poem, The Odyssey, but here she is your by war; he’s an Iraq veteran media revelations of of Uncles numbered 1 through 6, of a great main focus. You delve deep into the trials who can only survive by exploitation in all sorts of grandfather with a Harem, share the stage and triumphs of her life, beginning in means of a mechanical industries, I can’t think of a with the secret police taking her parents the halls of her father, the Titan, Helios, skeleton. Marianna’s life has better time to read a smart into custody, and a bombed apartment. the Greek personification of the Sun. been ruined by men – she book about uneven power This would be a wonderful book if it Circe is shunned and tormented by had to flee the country after dynamics. Lisa Halliday was simply Side A, but it is in the addition nymphs, gods and titans alike, all because 10 READINGS MONTHLY FICTION April 2018 she is different; she does not have the Alternate Side feels like a death, a divorce – his divorce. The Mars Room strengths, looks, nor voice of divinity. Anna Quindlen Three years ago, Karina removed their Rachel Kushner But what she does discover, with the help Scribner. PB. $32.99 framed wedding picture from the living Jonathan Cape. PB. Was $32.99 of a mortal, and love, is her own new Some days Nora Nolan room wall, but she still hasn’t moved on for $27.99 power – witchcraft. In this discovery lies thinks that she and her various reasons. Karina becomes Richard’s Romy Hall is at the start of her freedom and exile combined when husband, Charlie, lead a reluctant caretaker, and they try to two consecutive life a fearful Zeus banishes her to a remote charmed life – except when reconcile their past before it’s too late. sentences, plus six years, at island called Aiaia, there she will forge there’s a crisis at work, a Stanville Women’s her skills with the help of nature. leak in the roof at home, or From a Low and Quiet Sea Correctional Facility. Outside Fate will bring many to her door a problem with their twins Donal Ryan is the San Francisco of her over the thousands of years she abides at college. Then one morning she returns Doubleday. PB. $29.99 youth; the Mars Room strip there, and mix their destinies with from her run to discover that a terrible The powerful fourth novel club where she once gave lap dances for a her story: Ariadne and the Minotaur, incident has shaken her safe, dead-end from the multi-award- living; and her seven-year-old son, Jackson. crafty Daedalus and his fated son block New York City neighbourhood, and winning author of The Inside is a new reality. Romy sees the future Icarus, Medea, Jason and that Golden the fault lines begin to open: on the block, Spinning Heart. Farouk’s stretch out ahead of her until news from Fleece, and let us not forget Odysseus, at her job, especially in her marriage. country has been torn apart outside brings a ferocious urgency to her nor Athena. All will play their part by war. Lampy’s heart has existence. A bold and unsentimental in the epic that is Circe’s tale, as she Census been laid waste by Chloe. panorama of life on the margins of stands alone, an indomitable woman. Jesse Ball John’s past torments him as he nears his contemporary America, and an excoriating Circe is a character that I felt was a Text. PB. $29.99 end. The refugee. The dreamer. The attack on the prison-industrial complex. modern feminist from an ancient time, A captivating novel about penitent. From war-torn Syria to small- fighting her way through a man’s, or free will, grief, the power of town Ireland, three men, scarred by all Mazarine god’s, world. An inspiration to persevere, memory and the ferocity of they have loved and lost, are searching for Charlotte Grimshaw fight and endure even if all seems lost parental love. When a some version of home. Each is drawn RHNZ Vintage. PB. $32.99 and all against you. I could not turn widower is told that he towards a powerful reckoning, one that When her daughter vanishes away from this adventure, even when doesn’t have long to live, he will bring them together in the most during a heatwave in Europe, the last page was done, Circe continued wonders who will care for his unexpected of ways. writer Frances Sinclair to linger in my thoughts days after. adult son – a son whom he fiercely loves, a embarks on a hunt that takes Claire Atherfold is from Readings online son with Down syndrome. With no recourse The Italian Teacher her across continents and in mind, and with a desire to see the country Tom Rachman into her own past. What clues The House of Impossible on one last trip, the man signs up as a Text. PB. $29.99 can Frances find in her own Beauties census-taker for a mysterious governmental Conceived while his history, and who is the mysterious Mazarine? Joseph Cassara bureau and leaves town with his son. larger-than-life father, Bear Following the narrative thread left by her Oneworld. PB. $24.99 Bavinsky, cavorted around daughter, she travels through cities touched The House of Dear Mrs. Bird Rome in the 1950s, young by terrorism and surveillance, where ways of Impossible Beauties A.J. Pearce Pinch learns that his father’s relating are subtly changed, and a startling charts the glitter and Picador. PB. $24.99 genius trumps everything new fiction seems to be constructing itself. heartbreak of the Available 10 April else. After Bear abandons tumultuous 1980s in London, 1940. Emmeline his family, Pinch strives to make himself My German Brother New York. Inspired by Lake dreams of becoming a worthy – first as a painter, and then as his Chico Buarque the iconic documentary Lady War Correspondent but, father’s biographer, before settling, Picador. HB. $29.99 Paris is Burning and the after a misunderstanding, disillusioned, into a job teaching Italian in Ciccio already has problems: real House of Xtravaganza, Joseph she finds herself typing London. And when Bear dies, Pinch hatches romantic failure, an older Cassara brings a narrative truth to this letters for the renowned a scheme to secure his father’s legacy. With brother intent on breaking iconic decade in drag, gay and agony aunt of Woman’s his signature compassion and humour, the heart of every beautiful transgender history. Friend magazine. Mrs Bird is very clear: no Tom Rachman conjures a life lived in the woman in São Paulo, and a Sprawling from the late 70s to the ‘unpleasantness’. Problems from lovelorn, shadow of greatness. distant and larger-than-life early 90s, this novel follows Angel as she grief-stricken and morally conflicted father. Then he finds a letter enters the drag world for the first time readers are binned in favour of those who A Kind of Freedom marked ‘December 21, 1931. Berlin’, and his and her establishment of the House of fear their ankles are unsightly or have Margaret Wilkerson Sexton existential crisis intensifies: his father once Xtravangaza. As the matriarch of this trouble untangling lengths of wool. But J.M. Originals. PB. $26.99 had a child with another woman. Ciccio sets house, Angel, and her partner Hector, soon the thought of desperate women going Available 10 April out to locate his lost half-brother, but as recruit Venus, Juanito and Daniel. unanswered becomes too much to bear and Evelyn comes of age in New Brazil’s military government cracks down, Each member enters the house with Emmy decides to secretly write back. Orleans in World War II and and rumours of arrests and disappearances vivacious energy and determination chooses between privilege spread, Ciccio realises he has taken his eye to change their own destiny. These The Eight Mountains and love. In 1982, Evelyn’s off his immediate family. characters, and their relationships to Paolo Cognetti daughter, Jackie, is a single one another, are masterfully crafted Harvill Secker. PB. $29.99 mother grappling with her The Neighborhood – I wanted to celebrate their triumphs Pietro, a lonely city boy, absent husband’s drug Mario Vargas Llosa and protect them when they fell. Their spends his childhood addiction and unexpected return. Jackie’s Faber. PB. $29.99 ambitions and resilience, along with summers in a secluded valley son, T.C., was a square before Hurricane In 1990s Peru, during the their hopes for acceptance and love, in the Alps. Bruno, the Katrina, but fresh out of a four-month turbulent and corrupt years spur this captivating narrative. cowherd son of a local stint, he decides to start over until old of Alberto Fujimori’s Alongside this phenomenal cast of stonemason, knows the friend convinces him to stake his new presidency, Rolando Garro characters, the narrative’s strength is the mountains intimately. beginning on one last deal. For Evelyn, tries to blackmail high-profile masterful imagery of the glitzy ballroom Together they spend many summers Jim Crow is an ongoing reality and new businessman Enrique with scene and its juxtaposition with the exploring the mountains’ meadows and threats haunt her descendants. lewd pictures from his past. dark undertones of New York during this peaks, discovering the similarities and Having failed, the next day Garro publishes decade. Venus’ emerald green Cha Cha differences in their lives even as their paths The Librarian the pictures on the front page of the notorious heels, Angel’s hopes for a Chanel suit and diverge. Spanning three decades, this is a Salley Vickers magazine he edits. Meanwhile, Enrique’s wife Juanito’s first win at a ball are contrasted novel about the power of friendships and a Viking. PB. $32.99 is having an affair with the wife of Enrique’s with the dangers and bigotry they had meditation on loyalty, being in nature, and A charmingly subversive lawyer and best friend. Then Garro shows up to continually fight against including finding one’s place in the world. novel about a library in murdered, the two couples are thrown into a homophobia, racism, drug addiction 1950s England, by the whirlwind, and the magazine staff begin and the impending HIV/AIDs crisis. Every Note Played acclaimed author of The work on their greatest exposé yet. This book left a deep impression on me. Lisa Genova Cleaner of Chartres. Sylvia It perfectly encapsulates the drag scene in S&S. PB. Was $32.99 Blackwell moves to East No Live Files Remain 80s New York. While it showed the beauty, $29.99 Mole, a quaint market town András Forgách glamour and hope of this era, it didn’t An accomplished concert in middle England, to start a new job as a Scribner. HB. $29.99 shy away from the dark undertones that pianist, Richard’s children’s librarian. Yet the apparently Thirty years after the fall of litter this period of history. Its message performances received pleasant town is not all it seems. Sylvia communism in Hungary, as for love, understanding and the need standing ovations all over falls in love with an older man – but it’s acclaimed writer, translator, to continue fighting against bigotry is the world. That was eight her connection to his precocious young dramatist and visual artist important, and urges us to fight for a more months ago. Richard now daughter and her neighbours’ son that Andras Forgach investigated understanding and inclusive world. has ALS, and his entire will change her life and put them, the his family’s past he Rose Maurice is from Readings Doncaster right arm is paralysed. The loss of his hand library and her job under threat. uncovered a horrifying FICTION 11 truth. His mother, whom he deeply loved, Varina had been an informant for the Kadar regime. Charles Frazier She had informed not only on acquaintances Sceptre. PB. Was $29.99 but on family, friends and even her children. $26.99 Here, Forgach gives voice to his deceased Available 10 April mother, holding her responsible for her deeds The new novel from the while defending the memories he cherished author of Cold Mountain – a of her as a son, and imagining her response. stunning portrait of the devastation left by the One Clear Ice-Cold January American Civil War. With Morning at the Beginning of her prospects ruined in the the 21st Century wake of her father’s Roland Schimmelpfennig financial decline, teenage Varina Howell MacLehose. PB. $29.99 decides her best option is a life of security Available 10 April as the wife of Mississippi landowner and One clear, ice-cold January much-older widower Jefferson Davis. morning shortly after dawn, When is appointed President of the a wolf crosses the border Confederacy, it puts Varina and her between Poland and children at the white-hot centre of one of Germany. His trail leads all the darkest moments in American history. the way to Berlin, connecting the lives of The Woman at 1,000 Degrees disparate individuals whose paths Hallgrímur Helgason intersect and diverge. Those who catch Oneworld. PB. $24.99 sight of the wolf see their own lives Eighty-year-old Herra reflected, and find themselves searching Bjornsson lives alone in a for a different path in a cold time. This first garage with her laptop, an novel of Germany’s most celebrated oxygen tank and her father’s contemporary playwright is written in old hand grenade. Neglected prose of tremendous power and precision. by her family, she spends her days spying on her children A rare, original The Overstory by hacking their emails and preparing to and stunning Richard Powers lose the race against the ticking time bomb William Heinemann. PB. $32.99 of lung cancer. Based on the first Icelandic coming-of-age story Available 16 April president’s real-life granddaughter, this The Overstory unfolds in highly unusual and captivating tale spans interlocking fables that range the twentieth century, Europe and South from antebellum New York to America in a way that is as hilarious as it the late twentieth-century is heartbreaking. A memoir of family, Timber Wars of the Pacific loss and hope Northwest and beyond. An Women in Sunlight Air Force loadmaster in the OUT NOW Frances Mayes Vietnam War is shot out of the sky but saved Bantam. PB. Was $32.99 by a banyan. An artist inherits a hundred $29.99 years of photographic portraits of the same doomed American chestnut. These strangers The new novel from the and others – each summoned in different bestselling author of Under ways by trees – are brought together in a last the Tuscan Sun tells the and violent stand to save the continent’s few story of four American remaining acres of virgin forest. women in Tuscany. Kit Raine, an American writer An enchanting novel about how Sal living in the small Italian town of San Rocco, is distracted from her our untold stories haunt us, Mick Kitson work by the arrival of three women who Canongate. PB. $27.99 and the stories we tell ourselves have leased a beautiful house in Tuscany. Sal planned it for almost a Though novices in a foreign culture, with in order to survive. year before they ran. And Kit’s friendship and guidance, the three now Sal knows a lot of stuff. friends launch themselves into Italian life, Like how to build a shelter pursuing passions long forgotten – with and start a fire. And how to drastic and unforeseeable results. protect her sister, Peppa. Because Peppa is ten, which is how old Sal was when Robert started on her. Told in Sal’s distinctive voice, and filled Science Fiction with the silent, dizzying beauty of rural Scotland, Sal is a disturbing, uplifting story of survival, of the kindness of strangers, King of Ashes and the irrepressible power of sisterly love. Raymond E. Feist Voyager. HB. Was $39.99 Tangerine $34.99 Christine Mangan Available 5 April Little, Brown. PB. $32.99 The world of Garn had five A psychological thriller set in great kingdoms until the 1950s Morocco, soon to be a King of Ithrace and his major film starring Scarlett family were executed by Johansson and produced by Lodavico, the ruthless King George Clooney. Since of Sandura. Now four great arriving in Tangier with her kingdoms remain, on the From Cairo to Canberra new husband, John, the last brink of war. But rumour has it that the The electrifying new person Alice Shipley expected to see was newborn son of the King of Ithrace – Dr Anne Aly, Australia’s Lucy Mason. After a horrific accident, the survived, carried off during battle and adventure from the first Muslim woman MP, two haven’t spoken in over a year. Now sequestered by a secret society. Meanwhile, author of Magician Lucy is trying to make things right. But three friends are schooled in espionage and shares her story soon a familiar feeling starts to overtake assassination, and an apprentice Alice – she feels controlled and stifled by blacksmith must take his priceless Lucy. Then John goes missing, and Alice knowledge to the only person who stands a starts to question everything. chance of defeating Lodavico. 12 CRIME

of the father of her children, of more men dangerous – than Grace thinks? And what if Dead besides. There was only one person who he never killed Rachel at all? could see Dulcie for who she really was, and who could stop Dulcie’s violent acts Find You in the Dark Write – and it was her own daughter, Hazel. This Nathan Ripley with Fiona Hardy is her story, one of a woman whose courage Text. PB. $29.99 in the face of her brutal parentage brought Some retired folk have down a horrific killer. In the seaside town of Kennewick, Maine, the body of a hobbies, like knitting, or BOOK OF THE bookseller is found at the bottom of the cliffs he loved to woodworking, or perhaps MONTH walk along. His son, Harry, makes his way from the college The Darkness reading crime books. For Ragnar Jónasson Martin Reese, his hobby is to Crime graduation he will now miss to farewell the father he loved. Harry feels the heaviness of his loneliness in the world when Michael Joseph. PB. $32.99 buy stolen police files on he arrives, his college days so swiftly finalised, returning One morning, as she heads unsolved cases, find the dead as an orphan to his father’s house, where the stepmother he into her usual day in bodies, and helpfully call in the information barely knows is waiting for his support. Reykjavik’s police force, to the police. It seems like a favour, but for Detective Inspector Hulda Detective Sandra Whittal, she can’t help but Hermannsdottir is called think that someone who digs up bodies Swanson delicately moves back and into a meeting with her might not be too far from causing them in forth from past to present, and then – boss. Now sixty-four, Hulda the first place. When a cop goes missing and after a shocking event halfway through was destined for an unwanted retirement Sandra lands on his tail, Martin realises that – swings the point of view again at the end of the year, but now they want when you’re digging, you can’t always be her desk, her cases, and Hulda out early. sure what you’ll find – and his latest Alice is just how Harry remembers her: young and disarmingly After decades of her talents being discovery reveals that perhaps the person beautiful, even during this time of loss. Together they mourn neglected, she has one final opportunity, who was leaving the bodies behind did not the man they loved, until the police arrive once more: the in the two weeks before she is forced out, to want them disturbed. solve a cold case of her choosing. It’s easy All the Beautiful death of Bill Ackerson was no accident. But everyone adores for Hulda to decide: she wants to solve the Lies booksellers, don’t they? (They do, right?) As Harry tries to deal drowning death of an asylum seeker, a Peter Swanson with the notion of his father’s murder in the midst of his grief, A Scandal in case one of her useless colleagues declared Faber. PB. $29.99 the unnerving Alice cooks for him, cares for him, her closeness Bohemia distracting. When a young woman Harry recognises from his a suicide. But Hulda wants to be sure, and Gideon Haigh father’s funeral turns up in the bookshop looking for work, it at the end of her career and her patience, Hamish Hamilton. PB. $32.99 changes the course of his thoughts – and the violence on this beach community is not over. she will do anything to solve it. This bitterly cool procedural will take your With Alice’s story of her past told alongside Harry’s desperation now, Peter Swanson We’re lucky enough to get comfortable armchair all the way to delicately moves back and forth from past to present, and then – after a shocking event two books of early-twentienth-century Iceland – and to danger. halfway through – swings the point of view again. As a staunch fan of Swanson’s Girl with Australian true crime this month! Ned a Clock for a Heart, Swanson’s ice-cool writing style tells the story with both clarity and Kelly Award-winner Gideon Haigh tells the heart. The grief of those mourning for their loved ones feels real in a way many stone-cold Killer Intent story of Mollie Dean, a vibrant bohemian book characters never deliver. There is danger in these pages, from the most unexpected Tony Kent murdered in a Melbourne laneway and of places, and this unsettling book will pull you right underneath its waves. Elliott & Thompson. PB. $29.99 whose lifestyle saw society attempt to Regrettably the only book ignore her existence entirely. Haigh’s in this month’s batch investigation is not only about her death, where the title and author’s but her life. On the other side of the law name rhyme with each is Leigh Straw’s engaging account of the Greeks Bearing Gifts every pregnant family’s nightmare other, Tony Kent’s Killer incredible Lillian Armfield, Australia’s Philip Kerr material and made a harrowing, vice-grip Intent will not relent in its first female detective – a woman initially Quercus. PB. Was $32.99 thriller, one where a doctor and new pursuit of fair judgement. dismissed for who she was and whose work $27.99 mother, full of morphine and exhaustion, (Okay … I’m done.) Kent himself, a on the streets of 1920s Sydney saw her in Available 10 April fights for her instincts – even when no one champion boxer and barrister, brings the thick of the Razor Gang else believes her. I don’t know how the hell political nous and knuckle-splintering Wars and much else besides. Philip Kerr writes a tension to the story of an attempted five-hundred page Panic Room assassination that spirals into something Lillian Armfield thriller every year, and Robert Goddard much bigger, bringing into its wake a Leigh Straw makes them so damn Bantam. PB. $32.99 reporter on one of her earliest coups, a Hachette. PB. $32.99 good, but here we are Crime stalwart Robert member of the security detail that failed again. It’s 1957, and Goddard has opened the to stop the assassin before six bullets were Bernie Gunther, Kerr’s door (sorry) on another fired, and a barrister whose Troubled- Also out this month: whacked-about, knocked-down-get-up- excellent thriller – one that with-a-capital-T Irish past is never far Jo Nesbo adds to the Hogarth Shakespeare again semi-hero, has spent the time since sees disgraced estate agent enough behind him. Kent understands Project with Macbeth, you can read a review the war attempting to become somebody Don Challenor taking a trip the finer details of violence and the law of it on page 9 (Hogarth, PB, Was $32.99, different, and is now working for an to the Cornish coast to and ramps up the tension with Killer SP $27.99); some consistent favourites insurance company that sends him on the evaluate a lush multi-million-dollar Intent’s killer excitement. (Okay, that and their new titles with Jeffery Deaver’s path of a sunken ship. Upon realising the property as a favour to his ex-wife. The rhyme was a stretch.) The Cutting Edge (H&S, PB, $29.99), John ship has its own past with the war, Bernie property is vacant and the owner wants it Connolly’s The Woman in the Woods has to confront history once more, even sold fast, but Don soon discovers that the Paper Ghosts (H&S, PB, $32.99), Michel Bussi’s Time is while Europe desperately strives to prove property is not so empty as it seems, Julia Heaberlin a Killer (W&N, PB, $29.99), Donna Leon’s that peace is here. Luckily for readers, populated as it is by the unnervingly Michael Joseph. PB. $32.99 The Temptation of Forgiveness (William when Bernie’s around dark humour is naked Blake, a young artist who claims to Available 16 April Heinemann, PB, Was $29.99, SP $26.99), always close at hand, while peace be the housekeeper. The occasionally Carl is in a care home for Arnaldur Indridason’s The Shadow Killer absolutely never is. efficient Don soon discovers that the house dementia sufferers; he was (Harvill Secker, PB, Was $32.99, SP $29.99) is not what it seems – a closed panic room once a vaunted and Laura Lippman’s Sunburn (Faber, PB, – and that it might be holding a more Mine photographer, but now he’s $29.99); get your semi-appropriately-titled secretive past than either of its occupants. Susi Fox famous for the murder girl fix with Lexie Elliott’s disappearing Michael Joseph. PB. Was $32.99 charges he faced, though he young woman in The French Girl (Corvus, $29.99 My Mother, A Serial Killer can’t remember any of it. PB, $29.99); and keep your eye out for Alex Sasha wakes from an Hazel Baron & Janet Fife-Yeomans Grace is the younger sister of Rachel, whose Grecian’s The Wolf (Michael Joseph, PB, emergency caesarean, HarperCollins. PB. $32.99 disappearance saw Carl convicted for her $32.99), C.L. Taylor’s The Fear (Avon, PB, numb and alone. Memories Dulcie Bodsworth was the death, and Grace has spent years searching $29.99), Liz Nugent’s Skin Deep (Viking, PB, of what led her here – a car? perfect 1950s lady – always for answers. Posing as Carl’s daughter, she $32.99), L.S. Hilton’s sexxxy Ultima (Zaffre, blood? – are fuzzy in her baking and delivering takes him on a cross-country road trip, PB, $29.99), Harriet Alida Lye’s The Honey mind. Her belly is empty homemade cakes to her following the path of his photographs to Farm (Michael Joseph, PB, $32.99), John and her husband isn’t by local police station, being finally find out what happened to her sister. Fairfax’s Blind Defence (Little, Brown, PB, her side. When a nurse finally leads her to terribly lovely to everyone, With photographs aplenty, this complex $29.99), Daniel Cole’s Hangman (Trapeze, her premature son’s crib in the nursery, and adored by her psychological thriller asks the questions: PB, $29.99), Olivia Kiernan’s Too Close to she sees his spindly legs and tiny face and community. Like most picturesque 1950s what if Grace isn’t the only one lying about Breathe (Riverrun, PB, $29.99), and Keith knows, right then, that this baby boy is moments, however, Dulcie was not as who she is? Is Carl really suffering from Thomas’s The Clarity (Atria/Leopoldo & not hers. Australian Susi Fox has taken sweet as she seemed – she was a murderer, dementia, or is he much more astute – and Co., PB, $29.99) … and more! 13

The Bible in Australia New Meredith Lake NewSouth. PB. $39.99 Nonfiction In this surprising and revelatory history of the Bible in Australia, Meredith Lake gets under the skin of a This brilliant collection of short memoir from Indigenous text that’s been read, BOOK OF THE writers highlights an enormous diversity in the life wrestled with, preached and MONTH stories of Aboriginal people in Australia, from those tattooed, and believed to be everything from a resented imposition to Nonfiction who grew up in middle-class suburbia to those in self- determined communities, to missions and reserves, to the very Word of God. The Bible in Australia small communities in remote areas. It comprises the explores how in the hands of Bible-bashers, stories of people who have grown up speaking their immigrants, suffragists, evangelists, people’s language, people who have lived on country their unionists, writers, artists and Indigenous whole lives, people who belong to the Stolen Generations, Australians, the Bible has played a and people whose families have moved between cities for contested but defining role in this country. generations. Serving Our Country: Indigenous Australians, War, Each story is full of nuance and Defence and Citizenship Joan Beaumont & Allison Cadzow answers all sorts of questions, (eds) in beautifully complex ways, NewSouth. PB. $39.99 While Indigenous about Aboriginal experiences Australians have enlisted in Growing Up the defence forces since the Aboriginal in in contemporary Australia that Boer War, for much of this Australia time they defied racist Anita Heiss (ed.) often go unasked restrictions and were Black Inc. PB. $29.99 denied full citizenship There are many common threads in these stories: rights on their return to civilian life. In distinct as each one is, each writer has a story to tell about Serving Our Country Mick Dodson, John the pain of being singled out by racism and the relentless Maynard, Joan Beaumont, Noah Riseman, forces of colonialism in settler Australian culture, Alison Cadzow, and others, reveal the and it is infuriating and heartbreaking reading about courage, resilience, and trauma of these things endured by small children. One common Indigenous defence personnel and their experience was being told that you are both ‘not black families, and document the long struggle enough’ to be Aboriginal and ‘too black’ to be included in to gain recognition for their role in the the mainstream. Many of the authors have experienced defence of Australia. a racism of knowledge and ideas that runs so deep as to Readings will donate make it difficult to explain to anyone what ‘growing up $2 from every sale of Growing Up Aboriginal’ means, without playing into stereotypes and Aboriginal in Australia the expectations of colonisers. Several of the authors in Biography to the Indigenous this collection make a pertinent suggestion: that until the Literacy Foundation whole of Australia can ‘grow up a little more Aboriginal,’ until 31 May 2018. we can’t presume to know or share what this means with Girls at the Piano each other. Virginia Lloyd This collection details a lot of pain, but looks hopefully A&U. PB. $32.99 Read an extract from Growing Up to the future, too. Each story is full of nuance and answers Entering the world of Aboriginal in all sorts of questions, in beautifully complex ways, about some memoirs feels Australia on page 7. Aboriginal experiences in contemporary Australia that like an intimate often go unasked. Contributors include well-known writers, conversation with a thinkers and activists such as Tony Birch, Celeste Liddle, stranger who will, over the Deborah Cheetham, Adam Goodes and Miranda Tapsell, as course of your time well as community leaders, young people and elders from together, become your new different nations. Growing Up Aboriginal in Australia is a best friend. Reading Virginia Lloyd’s much needed addition to every Australian bookshelf, and exquisite memoir Girls at the Piano, tracing will challenge and impress every reader who opens it. her intense relationship with the piano (‘my Georgia Delaney is from Readings Carlton first love’), I burned with affinity for the shy, deeply focused girl-to-woman who was as ill-at-ease in the social world her peers seemed to instinctively inhabit as she was inherently connected to her music. Anthologies Australian Studies Girls at the Piano is the work of a memoirist who has finely tuned her craft (this follows her excellent first memoir, about The Displaced: Refugee Blue Collar Frayed: Working love, loss and grief, A Young Widow’s Guide Writers on Refugee Lives Men in Tomorrow’s Economy to Home Improvement). On one level, Lloyd Viet Thanh Nguyen (ed.) Jennifer Rayner tells the story of what the piano has meant Abrams. HB. $35 Redback. PB. $22.99 to her: how it shaped the girl and woman she In January 2017, Donald Blue-collar jobs for became, without her realising it at the time; Trump signed an order Australian men are how it gave her a secure vantage point from stopping entry to the disappearing. This is not which to engage with the wider world; how United States from seven just a product of economic as a creative outlet, it taught her focus and predominantly Muslim forces – it’s also the result of discipline – but also, how the constraints of countries and cutting the our failure to acknowledge competition (which encouraged technical number of refugees allowed their importance. The men mastery and discouraged experimentation) to resettle in the United States each year. losing their jobs in heavy industry or ultimately stifled her love of the instrument. In The Displaced, Pulitzer Prize–winning trades will not easily find new work; the Using a high-school reunion as a framework writer Viet Thanh Nguyen brings together evidence shows they are disengaging from for circling through the past, she reconnects a host of prominent refugee writers to the workforce. Drawing on extensive with her passion for the piano, while illuminate the refugee experience. The research and interviews, Jennifer Rayner interrogating why she lost it in the first Displaced is an indictment of closing argues that there can be blue-collar jobs in place. There are echoes (but never copies) of doors, and a powerful look at what it our future economy. In fact, we can’t keep Anna Goldsworthy’s Piano Lessons, one of means to be forced to leave home and find building a fair and prosperous Australia my favourite memoirs of the past decade. a place of refuge. without them. Lloyd’s journey is interwoven with the 14 READINGS MONTHLY NONFICTION April 2018 experiences of girls at the piano through mothers and daughters, about social Weaving the science of the mind into her The Work I Did: A Memoir of history (from Clara Schumann to her own pressures and the female experience, Levy personal story, this is a dramatic account of a the Secretary to Goebbels musically gifted grandmother): how the confronts a world not designed to brilliant brain gone awry. Brunhilde Pomsel & Thore D. instrument and conventions around it have accommodate difficult women and Hansen been both a vessel for creative expression, ultimately remakes herself in her own image. Rosie: Scenes from a Vanished Bloomsbury. PB. $27.99 and a means of containing that expression Life Brunhilde Pomsel described within polite boundaries. This is a beautiful Eat the Apple Rose Tremain herself as an ‘apolitical girl’ celebration of passionate creativity (whether Matt Young C&W. HB. $32.99 and a ‘figure on the margins’. professional or amateur) and how it can Bloomsbury. PB. $24.99 Available 16 April Employed as a typist during enrich and shape our lives. Matt Young joined the Marine Rose Tremain grew up in the Second World War, she Jo Case is from Readings Doncaster Corps after a drunken night austere, post-war London. worked closely with one of culminating in wrapping his When Rosie is ten years old, the worst criminals in world My Ikaria car around a fire hydrant. everything changes. She history: Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Spiri Tsintziras Young’s story drops us and her sister Jo lose their Goebbels. She was one of the oldest Nero. PB. $29.99 unarmed into Marine Corps father, their home, and -- surviving eyewitnesses to the internal Three years ago, Spiri culture and lays bare the most agonisingly of all -- workings of the Nazi power apparatus until Tsintziras found herself absurdism of 21st-century war, the manned- their beloved Nanny, the only adult to have her death in 2017. Her story illustrates how mentally, physically and up vulnerability of those on the front lines, shown them affection. Dispatched to far-right politics, authoritarian regimes and spiritually depleted. She was and the true motivations that drove a young boarding-school, they once again feel like dictatorships can rise, and how political stretched thin – raising kids, man to a life at war. Searing in its honesty castaways. But slowly the teenage Rosie apathy can erode democracy. running a household and and tender in its vulnerability, Eat the Apple escapes from the cold world of the Fifties, managing a business. Spiri’s is a powerful coming-of-age story that maps into a place of inspiration, where a young quest for a healthier life took her from her the insane geography of our times. writer is ready to be born. Cultural Studies suburban home in Melbourne to her family’s homeland of Greece, and to the Greek island Elizabeth Macarthur: A Life at Two Generations of Ikaria, where the people live happy, healthy the Edge of the World Anne Connor How to Fix the Future: Staying and long lives. Spiri’s heartwarming memoir Michelle Scott Tucker Ventura. PB. $29.99 Human in the Digital Age will console and entertain anyone bogged Text. PB. $32.99 In 1943, Jock Connor is part Andrew Keen down in the daily grind – encouraging you to In 1788 a young of a regiment sent to set up Atlantic. PB. $29.99 put your health and happiness first. gentlewoman raised in the a base camp at the Butibum In How to Fix the Future, vicarage of an English River. During an Inspection Andrew Keen combines his Bridge Burning and Other village married a of Arms, Jock’s gun experiences in Silicon Valley Hobbies handsome, haughty and accidentally discharges, with extensive interviews Kitty Flanagan penniless army officer: killing his friend and fellow and analysis to identify the A&U. PB. $29.99 John Macarthur. John took solider, Joseph Forrester. Jock returns to strategies we need in order to Kitty Flanagan has been credit for establishing the Australian wool civilian life, and his wife Bess, a man tackle the huge challenges of locked in an industrial industry, but it was practical Elizabeth emotionally and spiritually broken. When this digital century. This ground-breaking freezer, insulted about the who managed their holdings—while Anne Connor delves into her father’s past, book examines the best (and worst) practices size of her lady parts in dealing with the results of John’s manias: she learns about this tragedy for the first in five key areas - competition, innovation, Singapore and borne witness duels, court cases, a military coup, long time, and begins to tease out the story of oversight, self-regulation and social to the world’s most absences overseas and, finally, his descent her parents. responsibility. Throughout this book he successful wife swap. It’s into certified insanity. Michelle Scott shows that the stakes could not be higher: these valuable lessons from The University Tucker shines a light on an often- The Unmapped Mind: A Memoir how can we remain human in an age of of Life that have taught her so many things, overlooked aspect of Australia’s history in of Neurology, Incurable Disease digital machines? including the fact that cliches like ‘The this story of a remarkable woman. and Learning How to Live University of Life’ are really annoying. In Christian Donlan Factfulness: Ten Reasons these funny, true stories, Kitty provides Finding My Place: From Cairo to Viking. HB. $35 We’re Wrong About the World advice you didn’t even know you needed. Canberra - the Irresistible Story Shortly after his daughter and Why Things are Better This is a collection of laugh-out-loud, of an Irrepressible Woman was born, Christian Than You Think cautionary tales from one of Australia’s Anne Aly Donlan’s world shifted an Hans Rosling favourite comedians. ABC Books. PB. $32.99 inch to the left. He started Sceptre. HB. $26.99 Anne Aly was the first to miss light switches and Available 10 April A Certain Light Australian Muslim woman door handles when reaching When asked simple questions Cynthia Banham and the first counter- for them. He would injure about global trends, we A&U. PB. Was $32.99 terrorism expert to be himself in a hundred stupid ways every systematically get the $29.99 elected to federal day. These strange experiences were the answers wrong. In Cynthia Banham’s inspiring parliament. ‘What am I early symptoms of multiple sclerosis, an Factfulness, Professor of family memoir uncovers a doing here?’ she asked incurable, degenerative neurological International Health Hans true picture of what survival herself as she was sworn in with her hand illness. MS is a destructive disease, yet it is Rosling offers a radical new means. Unable until now to on her English translation of the Quran. also a perversely creative force. Donlan explanation of why this happens, and write her own story, Cynthia It’s a question the former professor has finds himself exploring a strange new reveals the ten instincts that distort our found that the lives of her raised more than once since she arrived in landscape - the shifting and bewildering perspective. When we worry about Italian grandfather, Alfredo, Australia aged two. Told with warmth, territory of the brain. everything all the time instead of embracing and his intriguing older sister, Amelia, humour and insight, Finding My Place is a worldview based on facts, we lose our resonated with her own. Discovering their an irresistible story by a woman who has The Wasp and the Orchid: The ability to focus on the things that threaten sacrifice, joy, fear and love, from Trieste to found where she belongs, and continues to Remarkable Life of Australian us most. Factfulness is an essential book that Germany and America, and finally to make her mark. Naturalist Edith Coleman will change the way you see the world. Australia, their stories mirror Cynthia’s own Danielle Clode determination and courage in the face of The Neuroscientist Who Picador. HB. $39.99 Cultural Dementia adversity. A Certain Light speaks to the heart Lost Her Mind: A Memoir of $34.99 David Andress of what really matters in life. Madness and Recovery In 1922, a 48-year-old Head of Zeus. HB. $29.99 Barbara K. Lipska housewife from Blackburn The former great powers of the The Cost of Living Bantam. PB. $29.99 delivered her first paper, on historic ‘West’ – especially Deborah Levy Available 16 April native Australian orchids, to Britain, the USA and France – Hamish Hamilton. HB. $29.99 In January 2015 neuroscientist the Field Naturalists Club of are abandoning the wisdom of Available 16 April Barbara Lipska’s melanoma Victoria. Edith Coleman maturity for senile daydreams This exhilarating memoir spread to her brain. It was, in would go on to write over of recovered youth, risking the shows a writer in radical flux, effect, a death sentence. She 300 articles on Australian nature, earn the collapse of their capacity for facing separation and had surgery, radiation and acclaim of international scientists and effective and just governance. At the core of bereavement, and emerging immunotherapy treatments. become the first woman to be awarded the this turn is an abandonment of political renewed from the ashes of a And then her brain started to Australian Natural History Medallion. attention to history. Historical stories are former life. Faced with the play tricks on her. She began to exhibit Despite this, she has faded into obscurity. deployed in public debate as little more than restrictions of conventional paranoia, became disinhibited, and couldn’t Zoologist Danielle Clode sets out to uncover dangerous fantasies. In this blistering living, Deborah Levy dismantles her life, remember things that had just happened to Edith’s story, from her childhood in assessment David Andress, one of Britain’s expands it and puts it back together in a new her. Small details became an obsession, but England to her unlikely success, sharing leading historians, shows how the West has shape. Writing as brilliantly as ever about she ignored the fact that she was about to die. along the way Edith’s lyrical writing. abandoned its history and lost its bearings. NONFICTION 15

Misogynation: lives. The book weaves together findings The True Scale of Sexism from the research lab, case studies and Laura Bates interviews with neuroscientists and other S&S. PB. $29.99 researchers working in the disciplines of One hundred years since neuroendocrinology, brain development, some women were first given brain health and ageing. the right to vote, we are still struggling to get to grips with the true extent of gender History inequality that continues to flourish in our society. In this collection of essays, Laura Bates uncovers Behemoth: A History of the the sexism that exists in our relationships, Factory and the Making of the workplaces, media, homes and on our Modern World streets. A bold, witty and incisive analysis Joshua B. Freeman of current events, Misogynation makes a W.W. Norton. HB. $39.95 passionate argument for stepping back, Factories, with their opening our eyes and allowing ourselves to ingenious machinery and see the bigger picture. miraculous productivity, are celebrated as modern Packing My Library: wonders of the world. Yet “Historians have long neglected An Elegy and Ten Digressions they have also fuelled our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Alberto Manguel fears of the future. Joshua military service… Understanding this Yale. HB. $37.99 B. Freeman takes readers from the textile history is crucial to truth, justice and In June 2015 Alberto mills in England that powered the reconciliation” – Karen Mundine Manguel prepared to leave Industrial Revolution to the steel and car his centuries-old village plants of twentieth-century America, hile Aboriginal and Torres home in France’s Loire Valley Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, to Strait Islander people have and reestablish himself in a W today’s behemoths making trainers, toys enlisted in the Australian Defence one-bedroom apartment on and iPhones in China and Vietnam, Forces since the Boer War, for Manhattan’s Upper West tracing arguments about factories and much of this time they defied racist Side. Packing up his enormous personal social progress through such critics and restrictions and were denied full library, choosing which books to keep, store, champions as Marx, Ford and Stalin. or cast out, Manguel found himself in deep citizenship rights on their return to reverie on the nature of relationships civilian life. Based on oral histories collected across Australia and between books and readers. In this re- Philosophy diverse contributions from John Maynard, Joan Beaumont, Allison evaluation of his life as a reader, the author Cadzow, Mick Dodson and more, it documents the long struggle to illuminates the art of reading and affirms gain recognition for their role in the defence of Australia. the vital role of public libraries. Radical Sacrifice www.newsouthpublishing.com Terry Eagleton Environmental Yale. HB. $39.99 The modern conception of Studies sacrifice is at once cast as a victory of self-discipline over desire. But even in the Old Sunburnt Country: Testament, the dual natures TRA The History and Future of of sacrifice, embodying both AUS LIAN BOOKS Climate Change in Australia ritual slaughter and moral FOR Joëlle Gergis rectitude, were at odds. In this analysis, AUSTRALIAN KIDS MUP. PB. $34.99 Terry Eagleton makes a compelling What was Australia’s climate argument that the idea of sacrifice has long like before official weather been misunderstood. Meditations on death records began? Sunburnt and eros, Shakespeare and St. Paul, irony Country pieces together and hybridity explore the meaning of Australia’s climate history for sacrifice in modernity, casting off the first time, uncovering a misperceptions of barbarity to reconnect the continent long vulnerable to radical idea to politics and revolution. climate extremes. It gives an unparalleled perspective on how human activities have altered patterns that have been with us for Politics millions of years, and what climate change looks like in our own backyard. Sunburnt Country highlights the impact of a warming A History of the World in planet on Australian lifestyles and Seven Cheap Things: A Guide ecosystems and the power we all have to to Capitalism, Nature, and the shape future life on Earth. Future of the Planet Raj Patel & Jason W. Moore Black Inc. PB. $34.99 Health Don’t be fooled by the simplistic title of this book as there are profound The Women’s Brain Book insights into the economic, Dr Sarah McKay social and environmental Hachette. PB. $32.99 processes of the planet to be Dr Sarah McKay is a found on almost every page. neuroscientist who knows The authors have managed to achieve the everything worth knowing near impossible task of bringing together about women’s brains, and research and theory from seemingly shares it in this fascinating, disparate disciplines to try and explain how essential book. This is not a the earth and its people have ended up in a book about the differences state of environmental emergency. between male and female brains, nor a book Complex terms such as ‘World Ecology’ using neuroscience to explain gender- and ‘Capitalocene’ are deftly explained and specific behaviours. Instead, it gives insight used to re-imagine history in a way that will into brain development throughout women’s challenge everything you thought you knew 16 READINGS MONTHLY April 2018 about the way the world works. The seven forward-thinking framework of practical for the importance of virtues like hope, ‘cheap things’ from the title are nature, advice for all women who are determined to gratitude and wisdom for our mental Food & money, work, care, food, energy, and lives. seize control of their lives, their workplaces, health. You will walk away from this book For capitalism to thrive these are the things and their country. This book redefines both educated and deeply enriched. that have been devalued and unequally expectations for women looking to lead. Gardening compensated. Binaries such as ‘society and The Lost Boys: Inside Muzafer with Chris Gordon nature, coloniser and colonised, man and Growing Pains: The Future of Sherif’s Robbers Cave woman, the West and the Rest, white and Democracy (and Work) Experiments non-white, capitalist and worker’ have been Gwynne Dyer Gina Perry One Knife, One Pot, One Dish normalised in order to violently dominate Scribe. PB. $29.99 Scribe. PB. $32.99 Stéphane Reynaud most humans and the natural world. Available 16 April Available 16 April Murdoch. HB. $39.99 But this is not a book without hope. The We are now living in a world In 1954, a group of boys were Much-loved French chef authors want to write slaves, Indigenous where Brexit and Trump are split into two groups, and Stéphane Reynaud is People, women, and workers who have daily realities. But how did encouraged to bully, harass, well-known for making always resisted the capitalist order back this come about, and what and demonise each other. French fare convivial into history. Current groups such as La does it mean for the future? The results would make for all (except vegans). Via Campesina (International Peasant’s Populism and ultra- history as one of social This book shows us the Movement), Movement for Black Lives nationalism brought about psychology’s classic studies: tricks of the trade and and Reclaim the Streets are all developing the rise of Hitler and Mussolini in the the Robbers Cave experiment. Officially, the celebrates Reynaud’s considered approach alternative frameworks for the planet. The 1930s. Now, as Trump sits in the White experiment had a happy ending: the boys to family cooking. This is a perfect book authors’ own contribution offers a program House, Britain negotiates its way out of the reconciled, demonstrating that while hatred for cooks at all levels and will become a of ‘recognition, redistribution, reparation, EU, and countries across Europe see is a powerful force, so too is cooperation. Yet firm favourite in your home kitchen. re-imagination and recreation’. substantial gains in support for the the true story of the experiments is far more This book is challenging but more than extreme Right, award-winning journalist, complex. In The Lost Boys, Gina Perry Barcelona Cult Recipes worth the effort and essential reading author, and historian Gwynne Dyer asks explores the experiment and its Stephan Mitsch for anyone interested in history, politics, how we got here, and where we go next. consequences, piecing together a story that Murdoch. HB. $49.99 economics, environmental studies, has never been told before. If you close your eyes philosophy, feminism or cultural studies. Populism Now!: The Case for you can almost see and Kara Nicholson is from Readings online Progressive Populism smell the sights and David McKnight Travel Photography flavours of a Barcelona The Big Four NewSouth. PB. $29.99 evening. No? Then this Ian D. Gow & Stuart Kells Populism can be a dirty glorious cookbook filled Latrobe University Press. PB. $32.99 word. But rather than The Italian Garden: Restoring a with photos, recipes and Across the globe, the associating it with Renaissance Garden in Tuscany stories will do the trick. Mitsch has been so-called Big Four accounting demagoguery and exclusion, Cecilia Hewlett & Narelle McAuliffe living there for nearly twenty years and and audit firms – Deloitte, might we better see it as a (eds) with gardening notes by my goodness he knows the local places, PricewaterhouseCoopers, backlash against free market Paul Bangay the culinary specials and the cellars. Ernst & Young, and KPMG – globalisation? This timely T&H. HB. Was $49.99 are hugely influential. They and persuasive book exposes the failures of $44.99 CIBI globalisation. David McKnight argues that have changed how we work, The Italian Garden is Meg & Zenta Tanaka a progressive populism could address manage, invest and how we are governed. a collaborative work Hardie Grant. HB. Was $50 Their history is a fascinating story of wealth, economic grievances without scapegoating centred on the restoration $44.99 power and luck. But today, the Big Four face immigrants or ethnic minorities. In a world of a traditional Italian Everything you love an uncertain future. Both colourful and where the super-rich get richer, one that is garden at the Monash about Japan is included authoritative, this account of the past, charged with hate-filled language as people Centre at Palazzo Vaj in in this delightful present and likely future of the Big Four is look for someone else to blame, the case for the heart of medieval cookbook! CIBI is based essential reading for anyone curious about progressive populism must be heard. Prato in Tuscany. Over the centuries the on home-style cooking the fate of the global economy. garden had become a rubble-strewn carpark inspired by the gorgeous and the current director of the centre Dr Collingwood restaurant Russian Roulette: The Inside Psychology Cecilia Hewlett, was inspired by the of the same name. This Story of Putin’s War on America discovery of fifteenth century frescoes in completely accessible cookbook has and the Election of Donald Trump 1967 to initiate the project to restore the seamless recipes for family feasts as well Michael Isikoff & David Corn I Feel You: A Journey to the garden. This is delightful book that touches as super-impressive dinner parties – and Twelve. PB. $27.99 Far Reaches of Empathy on a number of important and interesting all the ingredients are easy to come by. This story of high-tech spying Cris Beam themes: the significance of gardens in and multiple political feuds is Scribe. PB. $32.99 intellectual and creative life, the strong ties Naked for Satan told against the backdrop of Every generation, a phrase between Australia and Italy that can produce Kevin Middleton & Mark Favaloro Donald Trump’s strange enters our consciousness. In positive community outcomes, the history of Melbourne Books. HB. $48 relationship with Vladimir the sixties it was civil rights; the Italian garden, and the history of Prato in Fitzroy’s Naked for Satan Putin and the curious ties in the eighties, it was its Tuscan context. has become a destination between members of his self-esteem; now our word Any lover of Italy and Italian culture will that epitomises the inner circle – including Paul Manafort and is empathy. In this book, enjoy the taste of living in a medieval Italian Melbourne bar scene. Michael Flynn – and Russia. Russian Roulette Cris Beam talks to scientists Tuscan city conveyed by the contributors, This cookbook by the chronicles and explores this bizarre scandal, studying mirror neurons and to teachers and be reminded afresh of holidays or same team takes you one explains the stakes, and answers one of the helping children identify emotions, and to longer visits. Garden lovers will enjoy Paul step closer to creating biggest questions in American politics: how victims of abuse. Along the way, she Bangay’s generous involvement and Luke that magic at home. Think cocktails and and why did a foreign government infiltrate examines her own past and family Mangan’s essay on the Italian Renaissance fancy-pants finger-food – I promise you the country’s political process and gain relationships, and discovers what it means Garden. Cecilia Hewlett’s essay explores the recipes are easy to follow and this is influence in Washington? to ‘feel you’ – and how we can all apply Italy’s always fascinating history of political the perfect party cookbook. empathy to our lives. intrigue conducted through art and holy Dear Madam President: An miracles, including the betrayal of Prato by Open Letter to the Women The Hope Circuit neighbouring Florence in 1512 as the Medici Everything I Know Who Will Run the World Martin Seligman family sought to reinforce their power. Fans About Cooking I Learned Jennifer Palmieri Penguin. PB. $34.99 of religious artefacts will enjoy the story from the Country Women’s H&S. HB. $24.99 In this memoir, Martin of the Sacred Belt – an object of popular Association of NSW Dear Madam President is an Seligman recounts how he devotion that continues to draw pilgrims to CWA NSW empowering letter from learned to study optimism – Prato today and which illustrates the ongoing Murdoch. HB. $16.99 former White House including a life-changing devotion to the Virgin Mary in a religion that Do not deny it. The recipes Communications Director conversation with his has done rather a lot to suppress and control in any of the Country Jennifer Palmieri to the first five-year-old daughter. In the power of the feminine. Women’s Association woman president, and by wise, eloquent prose, This is a beautifully illustrated book with cookbooks are tried, tested extension, to all women Seligman tells the stories behind some of excellent photography by Simon Griffiths and accurate. This book working to succeed in any field. Using his major findings, and writes at length for and historical images drawn from a variety will take you from roast lessons learned during her experiences the first time about his own battles with of sources that complement the text to the chicken all the way to with Hillary Clinton, President Obama, and depression. All the while, Seligman works benefit of the reader. lemon slice, and, truly, every cookbook Elizabeth Edwards, Palmieri creates a out his theory of psychology, making a case Margaret Snowdon is from Readings Carlton collection needs at least one CWA cookbook. READINGS MONTHLY 17 April 2018

after years away she returns to Nor’s reliable lately. When Happy wins a French Young world and brings turmoil and danger essay competition, she meets the to the sleepy Island. Nor is a wonderful eccentric Professor Tanaka, her girl- character; while she’s struggled with the gardener Alex, and an intern also named Adult impacts of a painful childhood at the Alex. But things go awry when Happy hands of her mother, she’s been shaped ends up kissing both of the Alexes. Soon by the love of family, community and neither is speaking to her and she has nature. Walton writes so beautifully and gone from two Alexes to none. Neverland is the unofficial name for the island of Learmonth, the Pacific Northwest setting is utterly BOOK OF THE a place of sanctuary for troubled teens dealing with mental striking. The environment is so lively and health issues. This is the place where Katherine is sent Fragments of the Lost MONTH the pages bubble with an intoxicating, following a self-harm episode. But for Katherine, Neverland Megan Miranda Young Adult supernatural energy. is not just a place of sanctuary but her home ground. This Puffin. PB. $17.99 This is a dark novel, but while horrifying is where she was raised, and where her father penned his Following the death of and violent Fern drags an ominous shadow famous, semi-autobiographical work titled The Kingdom of her ex-boyfriend Caleb, over the island, themes of healing and the Sea; a work that imagined a world inhabited by selkies, Jessa Whitworth is family are strong and skilfully navigated. pirates and sea monsters. In this work, Katherine was cast asked by his mother to Nor’s powers include a connection to as a character that was so perfect that the real Katherine pack up his things. the natural world; she understands the felt herself a disappointment and an unfortunate ‘faux pas Maybe it will help Jessa thoughts of animals and the book’s non- of existence’. But her greatest struggle relates to the buried work through the guilt human characters are a real delight. I’ve trauma that threatens to pull her under. she feels about their been fascinated by witches since I was final moments small and this book brought to mind two together. But as she begins to box up the This is a powerfully emotional and of my favourite stories, The Changeover by pieces of Caleb’s life they trigger mythic work that draws parallels with Margaret Mahy and a movie I was obsessed memories that make her realize their the journey of Odysseus, cast adrift on with as a teen, The Craft. Recommended for past relationship may not be exactly as teenage readers 14+ Neverland the high seas, in pursuit of safe harbour she remembered. Each fragment of his Kim Gruschow is from Readings St Kilda life reveals a new clue that propels Jessa Margot McGovern to search for the truth about Caleb's Random House. PB. The island presents a powerful metaphorical element in $19.99 this work. It is separated from the mainland by a treacherous Small Spaces accident. What really happened on the passage of sea where a two-hundred metre wide hole (depth Sarah Epstein night he died? unknown) turns the water a darker shade and the ocean Walker. PB. $19.99 floor drops away. Katherine’s father had told her that a monster lived in the hole but the At the age of 8, I Have Lost My Way scariest imagining for Katherine was a ‘void of unchartered horrors’; that is, the buried Tash witnesses her Gayle Forman psychological trauma relating to the death of her parents. imaginary friend, S&S. PB. $19.99 Rebellion, too, is a powerful change agent in this story and Katherine teams up with Sparrow, kidnap Around the time that close friends, who are also patients, against the healthcare workers that are trying to help 6-year-old Mallory Freya loses her voice them. These teens are well stocked with contraband such as drugs and condoms and, in Fisher at a fair. The little while recording her Katherine’s case, razor blades for self-harm purposes. But their vulnerability is palpable girl turned up 4 days debut album, Harun is and the reader is cast adrift between one broken teen and another as the teens struggle later in the middle of a making plans to run against their personal demons and fight for their well-being. national park, with away from home to This is a powerfully emotional and mythic work that draws parallels with the journey chunks of her hair missing and completely find the boy that he of Odysseus, cast adrift on the high seas, in pursuit of safe harbour. mute. No one believes Tash when she tells loves, and Nathaniel is them about Sparrow and she spends the arriving in New York Natalie Platten is from Readings Doncaster next 9 years in therapy convinced by her City after a family tragedy leaves him therapist and everyone around her she isolated on the outskirts of Washington made it up for attention. Now she’s 17, she State. After the three of them collide in hasn’t seen Sparrow since that day and if Central Park, they slowly reveal the parts Amelia Westlake leads to all manner of hijinks, secret she wants to go to uni in Melbourne this is of their past that they haven't been able Erin Gough relationships and scandal. her last year to prove to her parents she to confront, and together, they find their can be trusted – that she has her anxiety way back to who they're supposed to be. HG Egmont. PB. $19.99 In the end, it is the friendships and the love between the characters that gets and claustrophobia under control. Then Amelia Westlake is them through. The whole confection Mallory Fisher’s family return to town. a screwball A Land of Permanent culminates in the rockingest school And so does Sparrow. comedy with a strong Goodbyes formal you could ever wish to attend, and I spent the entire book desperately political edge set in a Atia Abawi is topped off with a scene slyly borrowed trying to figure out if Sparrow was real posh Australian private Philomel. PB. $19.99 from Spartacus. Yay for Amelia Westlake, and if so, who is he? Every time I thought girls’ school. The arrival Available 16 April whoever you are! I’d worked it out something new would of Will (Wilhelmina) Tareq lives with his big come up, or he would do something Everhart to Rosemead Fans of David Levithan and Rachel and loving family in a completely impossible and in the end Grammar brings a fresh Cohn’s novels will recognise and welcome country ripped apart the only thing I could know for sure set of eyes to the school’s stuffy traditions. this book. So will anyone looking for a by war. When the about Sparrow is he is terrifying. He These traditions include tolerating a male funny, edgy read. bombs strike, his city appears suddenly on a stormy night in sports master’s ogling of the girls in his Mike Shuttleworth is from Readings Hawthorn is in ruins and his life a lonely little girl’s bedroom crouched charge and a serene sense of wealthy destroyed. Those who on a window seat wanting to play a entitlement. These are not things Will can The Price Guide to the Occult survive face an game, his bare dirty toes curled over turn a blind eye to. Leslye Walton uncertain future, the edge like tree roots. His presence is When Will and her mismatched Candlewick. HB. $24.99 including Tareq’s family who know they so sinister it extended beyond the book friend Harriet create a cartoon depicting I absolutely adored must leave to stay alive. They travel from and I frequently found myself putting the unpleasant sports master Coach Leslye Walton’s Syria to Turkey to Greece, facing danger it down and glancing nervously at the Hadley, they also create a problem – how extraordinary debut at every turn, and Tareq must find the shadows around me. Small Spaces is good, to publish it in the school newspaper novel, The Strange and resilience and courage to complete his terrifying fun and I highly recommend it without being immediately expelled? Beautiful Sorrows of Ava harrowing journey. This heartbreaking for all brave souls 14+ who love reading. Enter, Amelia Westlake. Lavender, and was so story of refugees escaping from war-torn Author Erin Gough’s second novel excited to read this Dani Solomon is from Readings Kids Syria is masterfully told by a foreign arrives bang on time for the #MeToo long-awaited witchy correspondent who experienced the movement. Her feisty characters respond follow up. Paris Syndrome crisis firsthand. to the threats of sexism, homophobia and Nine generations of Blackburn women Lisa Walker the wealth divide with a heady mix of art, have lived on Anathema Island. Each HarperCollins. PB. $19.99 anarchy and anger. Both Will and Harriet has unique powers and a curse that has Happiness (Happy) are, more or less, openly gay and in that passed down from Rona Blackburn, the Glass has been a loner sense Amelia Westlake picks up some of first woman to arrive and an extremely since moving to See the next the themes of Gough’s popular debut, The powerful witch whose tragic story has Brisbane and yet still Flywheel. The tone of this novel shifts become island legend. dreams about living in page for Kids midway through towards something At seventeen, Nor Blackburn is Paris with her best more overtly political but retains its the youngest Blackburn woman and friend Rosie after they Books romantic strand. her mother Fern is a bitter, brutal and finish Year 12. But Rosie And keeping Amelia’s identity secret misguided witch. When Fern emerges hasn't been terribly 18 KIDS Kids Books

Stories for Boys Who Dare to be Different is a welcome BOOK OF THE addition to the collections of biographies designed to inspire MONTH children. Similar to Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls, it Nonfiction offers 100 snapshot biographies of boys and men who pursue their passions/interests/rights, often against expectations.

In order to create a world in which everyone is equal and free, we must give our boys something to aim for

These accessible stories range from historical figures Stories for Boys in all fields, such as Mahatma Gandhi, Galileo Galilei, Who Dare to be and Nelson Mandela, to contemporary figures with Different strong values who set positive models of activism, such Ben Brooks as Ai Weiwei, Jamie Oliver, or Steve Irwin. There are also Quercus. HB. Was $35 individuals whose stories are more personal – dealing $29.95 with gender decisions, overcoming learning or physical Available 10 April difficulties, or making challenging decisions – including Vedran Smailovic, who played his cello for 22 days amidst the ruins of besieged Sarajevo to honour the dead. And, finally, there are stories of boys who have taken action. For example, after learning about the shortage of clean water in Africa, 6-year-old Ryan Hreljac fundraised to buy a well and eventually formed a charity organisation. In order to create a world in which everyone is equal and free, we must give our boys something to aim for. My 12-year-old son pored over Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls and found Stories for Boys Who Dare to be Different equally inspiring. Be prepared for all the questions, ideas and rich conversations these snapshots will generate. Picture Janine Larson is from Readings Kids Books

Alma and How She Got Her Name Lucy and the Dragonfly Juana Martinez-Neal Lucie Papineau Candlewick. HB. $24.99 Auzou. HB. $22.99 If you ask her, Alma Sofia Follow the adventures of Lucy, a Esperanza Jose Pura Candela has little girl with a very special gift. She way too many names: six! How did can make the sun smile, but when such a small person wind up with the Earth gets sick, Lucy too can feel such a large name? Alma turns to it. Her tears travel from the wings of Daddy for an answer and learns of a dragonfly all across the planet Sofia, the grandmother who loved where a little boy finally Junior books and flowers; Esperanza, the understands what is going on. In great-grandmother who longed to travel; Jose, the this beautiful and accessible tale Fiction grandfather who was an artist; and other namesakes, too. children will be introduced to climate change and the Alma starts to think it might be a perfect fit after all and protection of nature. realizes that she will one day have her own story to tell. My Mum is a Magician The Poppa Platoon in World War Chew Found in Melbourne Damon Young & Peter Carnavas (illus.) Danny Katz & Mitch Vane (illus.) Joanne O’Callaghan & Kori Song (illus.) U.Q.P. HB. $24.95 Omnibus. PB. $9.99 A&U. HB. $24.99 From the award-winning author/ Major Poppa, Abbie, and her little There is so much to do in illustrator duo Damon Young and brother Flynn are on a mission at the marvellous Melbourne - places to Peter Carnavas comes a Royal Show. They must enter The see and new friends to meet. spellbinding picture book Showbag Pavilion, fight their way Whether you live in Melbourne, celebrating mums everywhere. through crowds, defeat powerful are planning your first visit, or Some mums gulp green tea, with enemies, and somehow get to the are just curious – what will you bitter barley blends. But my mum other side to buy a Chunky Choco find in this vibrant city? A is a magician – her cup of coffee Cherry Chew Showbag. Will The beautifully illustrated counting never ends. All mums are different. But what if your mum Poppa Platoon win this battle? Will they make it out of book celebrating landmarks and was really different? What if your mum was a magician? there alive? Or is this a showbag too far? attractions in Australia’s most liveable city. Wait! (Books That Drive Kids Crazy, Book 4) Rory Branagan, Detective (Book 1) The Last Peach Beck & Matt Stanton Andrew Clover & Ralph Lazar (illus.) Gus Gordon ABC Books. HB. $19.99 HarperCollins. PB. $14.99 Viking. HB. $24.99 From the brains behind This Is a Ball, Meet Rory Branagan – he eats bad guys One fine summer’s day two Did You Take the B from My -ook? and for breakfast. Well, not actually. But he bugs discover the most The Red Book comes a brand-new is the best detective in town. Join Rory beautiful peach of the season giggle-inducing story. Parents find and his accomplice Cassidy as they and are faced with a dilemma themselves telling their kids to wait investigate the poisoning of Rory’s next – who should eat it? From all the time. Now this book is going to door neighbour. Rory’s adventures are internationally award-winning make everyone wait too. Once you all highly illustrated so you can see picture-book creator Gus and the kids start reading it, you can’t everything he gets up to in glorious Gordon comes this delightful do anything else until it’s finished. black and white. The first in a hilarious story about friendship and sharing. You’ll just have to ... wait. And the kids will love it! seven-book, comedy-crime series for readers of 8+ KIDS READINGS MONTHLY 19 April 2018

The Wild Magic Trilogy: Begone the The Wolf Keepers Middle Raggedy Witches (Book 1) Elise Broach & Alice Ratterree (illus.) Celine Kiernan & Victoria Semykina (illus.) Square Fish. PB. $14.99 Fiction Walker. PB. $16.99 Twelve-year-old Lizzie Durango and When witches kidnap Mup’s dad, she her dad have always had a zoo to call must journey to their home to save their home. Lizzie spends her days him, and so begins a fantastical watching the animals and taking note How to Win a Nobel Prize adventure of rhyming crows, talking of their various behaviours. One Barry Marshall, Lorna Hendry cats and outlawed magic. Witches afternoon she finds Tyler Briggs, a & Bernard Caleo (illus.) Borough is a dangerous place, ruled by runaway who has secretly made the zoo Piccolo Nero. PB. $14.99 a tyrannical queen and her band of his makeshift home. The two become raggedy witches. This is a middle- friends and, just as quickly, stumble While waiting to meet a famous grade fantasy adventure perfect for into a covert investigation involving the zoo wolves who scientist at her mum’s work, fans of Frances Hardinge and Katherine Rundell. are suddenly dying. Mary (who wants to win a Nobel Prize when she grows up) stumbles into a room in which a man in a crumpled Charlie and Me lab coat is talking to someone who Mark Lowery looks suspiciously like Albert Piccadilly. PB. $14.99 Classics Einstein. Mary sneaks closer (one Thirteen-year-old Martin and his things all scientists have in common beloved younger brother Charlie are on is an insatiable sense of curiosity) and realises it IS a special journey. They’ll be travelling Master Detective: Albert Einstein! The man in the coat, Professor 421 miles all the way from Preston to A Kalle Blomkvist Mystery Marshall, explains she has discovered a secret meeting the very tip of Cornwall, by train, bus Astrid Lindgren of all the Nobel Prize winners of the past who gather and taxi. Cheeky, irrepressible Charlie OUP. PB. $14.95 together to discuss science (and peace). is not like ordinary kids – born far too What an absolute treat – three After she threatens to reveal all, Professor early, he’s one in a million. Martin is newly translated books by the Marshall agrees to take Mary back in time to meet the doing his best to be a good big brother, world-famous author of Pippi scientists at their work and talk about the secret to but it’s hard when there’s something so huge coming Longstocking, Astrid Lindgren. First winning a Nobel Prize (a lot of hard work, curiosity, once they get to Cornwall. published in Swedish in 1946, these are perseverance and a healthy disregard for the things well-written, exciting detective ‘everyone’ knows to be true!). Between each chapter Fearless Frederic mysteries featuring three young is a science experiment related to the scientist Mary Felice Arena adventurers. Kalle and best friends was just talking to – don’t worry, Marie Curie’s related Penguin. PB. $16.99 Eva-Lotta and Anders are knights of the experiment is completely safe! This is a great, simple When the river rises and the city of White Roses, who battle every summer against the book for kids 8+ with an interest in science. Paris begins to disappear under water, dastardly Red Roses in the Wars of the Roses. They spy on Dani Solomon is from Readings Kids Frederic decides to help those who can’t one another, write insulting letters, have swordfights and help themselves. But as his heroic acts take turns stealing the Great Stonytotem. It’s all in fun, but The Extremely Weird escalate, so does the danger. And as the whilst having their great adventures Kalle often seems to Thing that Happened water subsides, can he find justice for stumble upon a true mystery. Despite living in a sleepy in Huggabie Falls his father and learn what courage really village, master thieves, murderers and kidnappers Adam Cece & Andrew Weldon (illus.) means? A story of friendship and regularly turn up. The White Roses are often put in real Text. PB. $14.99 heart-racing adventure – a perfect peril as they attempt to catch the criminals for the village follow up to the acclaimed The Boy and the Spy. In Huggabie Falls, something policeman. These are funny, fast-paced detective mysteries like having a maths teacher that are perfect for fans of Enid Blyton or detective stories, who’s also a witch is normal, because The Light Jar aged 8–11. We’re fortunate to finally have them in English! Huggabie Falls is the weirdest town Lisa Thompson Angela Crocombe is the manager of Readings Kids on Earth. But when something Scholastic. PB. $15.99 extremely weird happens! Kipp Nate and his mother are running away, Kindle and his best friends Tobias hiding out in a tumbledown cottage in Treachery and Cymphany Chan must the middle of a forest. When Mum heads Classic take on the evil scientist Felonius off for provisions and doesn’t return, Dark, Weirdness Eradicator, and contend with all kinds Nate is left alone and afraid. But of the Month of madness: killer vampire bats, Dutch werewolves and comfort can come from the most a Portuguese-speaking lab rat – anything to keep unexpected of places. In this page- Huggabie Falls from becoming normal! turning mystery will Nate find the The Extremely Weird Thing that Happened in bravery needed to face the troubles of The Marzipan Pig Huggabie Falls is packed with twists, turns, quirky his present and ultimately illuminate the future? Russell Hoban & Quentin Blake (illus.) illustrations from Andrew Weldon and a hilarious Walker. HB. $17.99 narrator who will remind you of Lemony Snicket. Twelve Nights What struck me immediately When the great Andy Griffiths calls it ‘wonderfully Andrew Zurcher about this little treasure was I weird and lots of fun,’ you know you’re in for big laughs Puffin. PB. $19.99 couldn’t help reading it aloud. and crazy adventures. Kay’s father is working late – as usual. Fed There’s a magical rhythm, almost a The Extremely Weird Thing That Happened in up, her mother bundles her daughters poetry, which sings off the page. Huggabie Falls is the Winner of the 2017 Text Prize for into the car and drives to her husband’s Russell Hoban has distilled the Young Adult and Children’s Writing and is the first in Cambridge college to collect him herself. exploration of love, yearning, the Huggabie Falls trilogy. But when they arrive, the staff claim that loneliness and even mortality into Pilgrim Hodgson is from Readings Kids nobody by his name has ever worked this poignant tale, an unlikely adventure brimming with there. Twelve Nights is a timeless magical meaning and a delightful humour. The Unicorn Quest fantasy adventure about one girl’s quest It begins with the pining of a marzipan pig, lost behind Kamilla Benko to reunite her family. a sofa until he’s eaten by a little mouse. And then, in a Bloomsbury. PB. $14.99 curious turn of events, the pig’s yearning is transferred (and seemingly amplified) in the mouse. Every subsequent Claire still worries about her older Wed Wabbit encounter is a little experience of life’s conundrums: the sister Sophie, who battled a Lissa Evans loneliness of a grandfather clock, the love of an owl for a mysterious illness last year. But David Fickling. PB. $16.99 taxi meter, the dance of a mouse in the moonlight. Cleverly, everything’s normal when they move You’re called Fidge and you’re nearly the story pivots back to another marzipan pig! into Windermere Manor – until the eleven. You’ve been hurled into a sisters climb a strange ladder in a strange world. You have three Refreshingly original, The Marzipan Pig, is an fireplace and enter Arden. There, they companions and a series of nearly imaginative, playful adventure with a fable-like quality; sad find a world in turmoil. The four impossible clues to solve. You also need yet funny and curiously beautiful. Russell Hoban’s masterful guilds of magic no longer trust each to deal with a cruel dictator and prose with its light, deft touch is brought to life with Quentin other, the unicorns have disappeared, and terrible three-thousand Wimbley Woos – and Blake’s dynamic and witty illustrations on every page. wraiths roam freely. Scared, the girls return home. But the whole situation is entirely your This is a wonderful read-aloud story to share with the when Sophie vanishes in the night, it will take all of fault. Wed Wabbit is a seriously funny family or a classroom; and perfect for an independent Claire’s courage to climb back up the ladder, find her adventure story about friendship, danger and the terror of reader aged 8+ who loves a quirky tale. sister, and uncover the unicorns’ greatest secret. never being able to get back home again. Athina Clarke is from Readings Malvern 20 BARGAINS

posters, satellite photos, and station wall who worked with him most closely. The Natasha returns to the home she fled many April maps. Combined with a text full of vivid result is an astonishing volume that shows years before. Taut, funny and poignant, The historical details and charming anecdotes the breadth and range of whose work was Healing Party is an electrifying debut novel it is a must-have for every history buff, full of humour, insight, and beauty. about faith and lies, the spirit and the flesh. Bargains lover of graphic design, and train fanatic – armchair or ticketed! The Best Australian Essays How About Never – Is Never 2016 & The Best Australian Good for You?: My Life in The Earth from the Air for Stories 2016 Cartoons 1946: The Making of the Children Geordie Williamson (ed.) & Bob Mankoff Modern World Robert Burleigh & Yann Arthus- Charlotte Wood (ed.) PB. Was $32.99 Now $10 Victor Sebestyen Bertrand PB. Was $29.99 Now $10 each This is a memoir in HB. Was $49.99 Now $15.95 HB. Was $21.99 Now $10 Geordie Williamson and cartoons by a long-time Drawing on contemporary The perfect gift for Stella prize-winning author editor of The New Yorker. documents from around the children! Soar above the Charlotte Wood curate 2016’s Bob Mankoff collects his world, foreign correspondent earth. Look down. And best non-fiction and fiction most popular illustrations and historian Victor what do you see? Water and writing from Australia’s and a selection of myriad Sebestyen has written a land, trees and buildings, finest writers. These images in a tribute to the powerful, revelatory book people and animals. And collections offer insightful form that traces his youth and career while about the year – set against a more, so much more. Let the remarkable and outstanding works assessing the psychology of cartooning. devastated landscape of dystopian horrors aerial photographs of Yann Arthus- featuring exciting new voices – that would signal the beginning of the Cold Bertrand take you to a whole new world of alongside established War, the end of the British Empire, and the Use Your Words discovery and adventure. favourites. Authors include: beginning of the rivalry between the United Catherine Deveny Helen Garner, Clive James, States and the USSR. PB. Was $27.99 Now $10 Kim Scott, Gregory Day and Lives of the Papunya Tula Want to write? Got a Artists Ellen Van Neerven. Champions of Collingwood: memoir, novel, screenplay The 125 Greatest Magpies Vivien Johnson or blog in your back drawer? HB. Was $69.95 Now $24.95 The Best 100 Poems of Michael Roberts & Glenn Need to get ‘unstuck’? This Dorothy Porter McFarlane Lives of the Papunya Tula is the magic pill you’ve been Artists chronicles the Dorothy Porter looking for. Catherine HB. Was $79.99 Now $33.95 beginnings of the Western PB. Was $24.99 Now $10 Deveny reveals the secrets Since 1892, more than 1200 Desert art movement in Dorothy Porter was one of that have made her ‘Gunnas’ Writing men have played senior Central Australia and the Australia’s true originals, Masterclasses sell-out successes around football for Collingwood. phenomenal development of renowned for her the country. With humour and passion, This book, celebrating the its founding art company over four decades. passionate, punchy poetry she explains the struggles all writers face club’s 125th anniversary, Through widely researched biographies of and verse novels. This and reveals how to overcome them. tells the stories of the 125 more than 200 men and women the book collection, the best of her greatest players to have pulled on the illuminates lives balanced between first life’s work as selected by her famous black and white jumper. These are Wellmania: Misadventures in contact and international stardom, poverty partner Andrea Goldsmith, presents the the men whose blood, sweat and heroics the Search for Wellness and record auction prices. many facets of Porter’s endlessly have made Collingwood one of the greatest Brigid Delaney captivating verse. An essential volume for sporting clubs in Australia. PB. Was $32.99 Now $12.95 long-time admirers and newcomers alike. The Lost Tudor Princess: The Cold-pressed juices, Chez Moi: Decorating Your Life of Lady Margaret Douglas quitting sugar, Paleo, hot Home and Living like a Alison Weir The Books that Changed yoga, mindfulness … if you Parisienne HB. Was $49.99 Now $13.95 My Life embrace these things you Sarah Lavoine Beautiful and tempestuous, Bethanne Patrick (ed.) will be happy, you will be PB. Was $27.99 Now $10 HB. Was $35 Now $12.95 and with royal Tudor blood well – just ask Instagram. Interior designer Sarah in her veins, some thought One hundred of today’s Wellness has become a Lavoine reveals how to create Margaret Douglas, Countess prominent literary and global mega-industry. But does any of this a truly French, meaningful, of Lennox, should be queen cultural icons talk about stuff actually work? Wellmania is an fulfilling lifestyle, no matter of England. She ranked high the books that hold a in-depth, entertaining, laugh-out-loud- where you live. Covering each at the court of her uncle, special place in their funny exploration of one of the most room in the home, Lavoine Henry VIII, and was lady of honour to five of hearts – that made them fascinating trends in our culture. explains her approach to his wives. Alison Weir brings her captivating who they are today. using colour, highlights the indispensable life – of scandal, political intrigue and royal Leading authors – including Margaret Woman of Substances: A elements of each space, and suggests how to romance – out of the shadows. Atwood, Dave Eggers and Gillian Flynn Journey into Addiction and add unforgettable details in order to create a – politicians, CEOs, actors, and other Treatment restful and chic environment. Stoppers: Photographs from notables share the books that changed Jenny Valentish their life and why they love them. My Life at Vogue PB. Was $32.99 Now $12.95 Annie’s Farmhouse Kitchen: Phyllis Posnick Using her own experience Seasonal Menus with a French HB. Was $100 Now $29.95 The Girl with the Lower Back and the expertise of Heart The name Phyllis Posnick is Tattoo leading researchers and Annie Smithers synonymous with Vogue Amy Schumer neuroscientists, journalist HB. Was $40 Now $19.95 and the extraordinary HB. Was $29.99 Now $12.95 Jenny Valentish investigates Annie’s Farmhouse Kitchen fashion editorials the Amy Schumer shares stories the female experience of is a window on the bucolic magazine’s audience loves. about her family, her drugs and alcohol. Travelling world of acclaimed This collection invites relationships, her career, to treatment facilities and AA groups around Victorian chef Annie readers to glimpse the complex production good - and bad - sex, Australia she follows the pathways that Smithers. Annie’s food is process – and the collaboration and recounting the experiences women, in particular, take into addiction – classic French Provincial, creativity – behind each extraordinary that have shaped who she is and out again. An insightful, rigorous and presented with a distinct pared back, editorial. It also features images from today. She proves to be a brutally honest read. accessible aesthetic and this book includes legendary photographers such as Irving frank, fearless, original, and always a best-of selection of three and four-course Penn, Annie Leibovitz, and Helmut Newton. entertaining storyteller. Her book will move Zero Zero Zero menus collected by her over the three years you, make you laugh and catch you Roberto Saviano completely off guard. of her restaurant, du Fermier, in Trentham. The David Foster Wallace HB. Was $49.99 Now $12.95 Reader Roberto Saviano, author of Railway Maps of the World David Foster Wallace The Healing Party the international bestseller Mark Ovenden HB. Was $49.99 Now $16.95 Micheline Lee Gomorrah, explores the PB. Was $39.95 Now $12.95 Where do you begin with a PB. Was $29.99 Now $10 inner workings of the world Railway Maps of the writer as original and Estranged from her family. of drugs and dirty money World is a gorgeously brilliant as David Foster Natasha is making a life for – its rules and armies – and illustrated Wallace? Here: with a herself in Darwin when her the true depth of its reach. compendium carefully considered sister calls with bad news. This is an electrifying and unforgettable covering two selection from his extra- Their mother is ill, and has story that goes around the globe and centuries of railway ordinary body of work chosen only a few months to live. through every level of society to show the advertising, surveyors’ plans, travel by a range of fellow writers, critics, and those Confused and conflicted, extent to which the drug trade affects us all. READINGS MONTHLY 21 April 2018

of cultural oddities, a work of art that’s so of creative ideas in full eruption. Writer- Film bad its good. Step forward, the deluded director Rian Johnson … eases into epic overachiever Tommy Wiseau, whose risible filmmaking like a pro … [and] makes sure self-financed, self-starring 2003 melodrama Jedi is bursting at the seams with knockout & TV The Room became a cult hit and global film fun surprises, marvelous adventure and phenomenon.’ – The Times (UK) shocking revelations that will leave your head spinning.’ – Rolling Stone The Killing of a Seventeen years have passed since the BBC released the Sacred Deer DVD OF THE original Blue Planet nature documentary. Described as the $29.95 first-ever comprehensive series on the natural history of TV MONTH ‘Yorgos Lanthimos’s The the world’s oceans, it was both a critical and commercial TV Killing of a Sacred Deer is success, and expectation for the sequel, which was gripping, creepy, intense and announced in February of last year, has been immense. Un Village Francais wholly original. [It] is thematically rich Viewers will not be disappointed. Volume 7 and pungent, looking deep into marriage, Blue Planet II is a visual feast, and a heart-stopping, $29.95 family, ethics, morals and trust. Most deeply affecting work of reportage. More of a second The final season of this immediately, it asks that classic question, voyage than a sequel, this series demonstrates how much ambitious French television “What would you do to protect your our knowledge of the ocean has expanded over the years. drama which confronts the family?” – but you’ve never seen it asked Advances in science and technology allow for further reality of France’s wartime past looking at like this. Outstanding.’ – ABC Nightlife discovery and insight, and every episode brims with collaboration, adaptation and resistance wonder and adventure. As with the original, the narration is during German occupation in the Second Lucky provided by Sir David Attenborough (truly, is there anything World War. $29.95 more soothing than this man’s voice?) and the richly A fitting farewell to actor evocative score that accompanies his words comes from Twin Peaks: A Harry Dean Stanton ‘Lucky Hans Zimmer, along with Jacob Shea and David Fleming for Limited Event Series Blue Planet II is, on the surface, the story Bleeding Fingers Music. $64.95 $39.95 of a lonely old man and the Blue Planet II will delight and thrill viewers of all ages. Twenty-five years after Available 4 April uneventful life he leads … But the movie also Meet strange and astonishing creatures, and discover the revolutionary cult TV sneaks up on you. What starts out trivial landscapes that look like they exist on other planet. The series was first shown on gradually turns into a drama about big ideas: stunning imagery is even more impressive when you consider the painstaking work television Twin Peaks returns. Expanding mortality and the meaning of life; the value that went on behind the scenes. In crafting this seven-part series, the crew from the the surreal world you thought you knew, of relationships and the vulnerability they BBC Natural History Unit travelled to 39 countries and captured more than 6,000 this limited event series takes you places require.’ – The Washington Post hours of footage. wonderful, strange and farther out. The impact of human existence on the ocean is a recurring theme throughout the series and the final episode, ‘Our Blue Planet’, tackles it head on by directly examining Murder on the Orient factors such as plastic pollution and climate change. After the enchantment of the Express $39.95 Documentary earlier episodes, this episode feels like an awakening of sorts. Blue Planet II is the kind of art that can change minds and lives, and I hope it does. ‘Kenneth Branagh’s lavish, all- star film adaptation of Agatha Bronte Coates is the digital content coordinator and the Readings Prizes manager Christie’s 1934 novel is a juicy Hawke: The Larrikin fruitcake of a film ... It’s classic Branagh: and the Leader sweeping landscapes, thundering score, $24.95 Film his French wife … [It] demands to be seen and capital-A Acting, and it’s shot on 65mm film Drawing on the most savoured … hold onto this incredible piece ... [allowing] for scope and scale, richness extensive television of work well after the credits roll. It is truly and colour, and a tactility reminiscent of interviews with Bob Hawke transcendent filmmaking.’ – news.com.au the kind of British Raj films that Branagh is ever conducted and featuring firsthand Call Me By Your Name explicitly throwing back to.’ – The Guardian accounts from John Howard, Bill Kelty, $29.95 The Disaster Artist John Eales, Peter Garrett, Meredith Available 11 April Was $34.95 Star Wars: Burgmann, Blanche d’Alpuget, Dennis ‘Set in the Italian countryside $29.95 The Last Jedi Richardson and Susan Ryan, this riveting in 1983, Call Me By Your Name ‘In the noble spirit of Tim $34.95 two-part political biography explores is the beautifully crafted Burton’s Ed Wood and Mel ‘The Last Jedi – Episode VIII the realities and contradictions of one of coming-of-age story of Elio, the 17-year-old Brooks’s The Producers of the Star Wars saga – is Australia’s greatest leaders to reveal the son of an American antiquities professor and comes a film that celebrates that most exotic simply stupendous, a volcano real Bob Hawke.

Cinema Nova presents

GALAXY QUEST April 29 (PG) APOLLO 13 June 17 (PG) STAR TREK II: THE Celebrate space & stars The alumni cast of a space opera television series "Houston, we have a problem." Those words were WRATH OF KHAN July 8 (M) have to play their roles as the real thing when an immortalized during the tense days of the Apollo 13 With the assistance of the Enterprise crew, with a fun event for alien race needs their help. With no script, no lunar mission crisis in 1970 in which NASA devised Admiral Kirk must stop an old nemesis, Khan the whole family! director and no clue about real space travel, the a strategy to return Apollo 13 to Earth safely after from using the life-generating Genesis Device as Revisit classic sci-fi films on the big actors have to turn in the performances of their the spacecraft underwent massive internal the ultimate weapon. STAR TREK II: THE WRATH screen, followed by a fascinating lives to become the heroes the aliens believe damage, putting the lives of the three astronauts OF KHAN is fondly noted as the best incarnation presentation and discussion on how them to be. on board in jeopardy. of the TV series that spawned it. space is depicted in cinema with Astrophysicist Dr Rachael Livermore (The University of Melbourne). Tickets online now - Book today

Melbourne’s home of quality arthouse and contemporary cinema 22 MUSIC

Carter Cash said, “I picked the artists … The Questions Popular who had a personal story that was Kurt Elling connected with Dad”.’ – Rolling Stone $21.95 The Questions is Kurt Music Liberty Ellling’s musical Lindi Ortega response to this $19.95 moment in history and the widespread anxiety Djarimirri was four years in the making. It features twelve Inspired by the of our times. It includes ALBUM OF beautifully harmonised chants and traditional songs. The soundscapes of Ennio a vibrant and surprising choice of songs, THE MONTH dynamic, modern, orchestral arrangements remind me of the Morricone, the movies from Bob Dylan and Paul Simon classics to work of Philip Glass and Steve Reich. Gurrumul and musical of Quentin Tarantino Folk jazz, Broadway, and the Great American collaborator Michael Hohnen previously worked with and drawing on her Songbook, plus several new originals. the Sydney Symphony Orchestra on the live album Life of Mexican and Irish Gurrumul. Three songs from this album have been reworked heritage, Liberty is a three-part concept through touring and production, ‘Djarimirri’, ‘Djilawurr’ album from Canadian country musician (scrubfowl) and ‘Baru’ (crocodile). These, along with another Lindi Ortega. Reflecting loss, séance, Folk/World nine new songs, are the fully realised extension of that work. resurrection and freedom the musical story is further enhanced by the addition The dynamic, modern, orchestral of Charlie McCoy’s harmonica and Exile: Songs & Tales of Irish arrangements remind me of the work of Nashville-based band Steelism. Australia Various Philip Glass and Steve Reich ... A perfect $21.95 fusion of traditional and modern, Gurrumul’s Djarimirri (Child Jazz/Blues An astounding line-up of of the Rainbow) unique voice evokes a contemplative mood artists from Ireland and Gurrumul in the listener and connects to Yolgnu culture. Australia, including $21.95 If I Said Only So Far I Take it Shane Howard, Paul Kelly Available 13 April A perfect fusion of traditional and modern, Gurrumul’s Back and Pauline Scanlon, unique voice evokes a contemplative mood in the listener Mia Dyson gather in a moving and connects to Yolgnu culture. The brilliant rhythmic $19.95 celebration of the Irish impact on Australian arrangements are hypnotic and heighten the effect. Completed just before the singer’s life, be it through music, literature, politics or Aussie rocker Mia death last year, this album is a remarkable achievement. Watch out for the upcoming justice. This CD + DVD captures the live Dyson’s ‘latest documentary film, Gurrumul, being released in cinemas soon. recording of Exile at Melbourne’s Hamer instalment … is Hall, and QPAC in Brisbane in 2016. Paul Barr is from Readings Carlton comprised of intricate melodies and solos that fluctuate in tone and Africa Rekk mood. 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It swings from [Courtney Marie with a new, sixteen-track modern Africa and traditional Africa, a sweet melodies with Andrews] takes a turn as album bristling with his crossing of different African cultures.’ fluttering strings to a soul singer … May Your Kindness Remain ever-quirky look at life, tragicomic rock songs and is about tearing sees Andrews … exercising a different set love and all points in something apart to find the beauty inside. of musical muscles from those that have between … The result is a release that bulges One People One World A mesmerising return from one of the most drawn her comparisons with Joni Mitchell. at the seams with quality, experience and Femi Kuti consistent songwriters in indie-rock music. [The title track] is awash in church organ, wonderful music.’ – Blues Magazine $21.95 lush harmonies, and a soaring, Afrobeat superstar ‘Femi Boarding House Reach impassioned lead vocal.’ – Rolling Stone After the Fall Kuti still lives somewhat Jack White Keith Jarrett, Gary Peacock & Jack unfairly in his dad, Fela Kuti’s shadow in the West $19.95 Sometimes Just the Sky DeJohnette ... [but] One People One ‘Boarding House Reach, Mary Chapin Carpenter 2 CDs $29.95 World needs no family [is Jack] White’s most $19.95 ‘The Standards trio’ has leg-up with its funky guitars and scorching freewheeling LP yet, For her latest project made many outstanding soul-powered brass. This fiery 50-minute featuring him leading Mary Chapin Carpenter recordings, and After the rant against the greedy and corrupt has the charge through has re-imagined a song Fall must rank with the more than enough to satisfy both the head several extended jams from each of her twelve very best of them. This and the hips.’ – theartsdesk.com with flashes of psychedelia, jazz, guitar studio albums spanning 1998 performance fireworks and digital trickery. “It almost an acclaimed 30-year marked Keith Jarrett’s return to the concert hurt my feelings to condense some of those career. It features new versions of some of stage after a two year hiatus. Joined by songs …” he says. “… I wanted to take punk, her most beloved songs such as ‘Heroes improvising partners Gary Peacock and Jack Soul/Funk hip-hop and rock & roll, and funnel it all and Heroines’ and ‘This Shirt’, and DeJohnette, he glides and soars through into a 2018 time capsule.”’ – Rolling Stone includes a newly written song – the title classics of the Great American Songbook. track – inspired by a Patti Smith interview. Things Have Changed No Mercy in this Land Music IS Bettye LaVette Ben Harper & Charlie Musselwhite Johnny Cash: Forever Words Bill Frisell $21.95 $21.95 Various $21.95 Available 13 April Music legends Charlie $19.95 ‘All the compositions on Legendary soul singer Musselwhite and Ben Available 6 April Music IS are Bill Bettye LaVette takes on Harper were introduced ‘Johnny Cash: Forever Frisell’s, freshly minted the songs of Bob Dylan to one another by John Words [is] a or harvested from his with the grit and Lee Hooker and in 2013 collaborative album capacious catalogue. experience that makes collaborated for their featuring Johnny The repertoire gives him her one of the greatest first and Grammy award-winning Blues Cash’s unknown poetry, nowhere to hide … Yet the music is a living soul singers alive. Things Have album Get Up! That was just the beginning. lyrics and letters … The reminder of what a superb composer he is: Changed is a masterpiece of interpretation Their friendship deepened during the many icon’s words are set to music and melodic, suggestive and quirky … On this of one of the greatest songwriters alive. months of touring which followed and it’s performed by an all-star lineup that spellbinding [solo] album Frisell shows us The album spans Dylan’s catalogue and that bond and closeness which makes this includes Chris Cornell, Willie Nelson, that even when alone, he and his guitar are features guest appearances by Keith new record something special. Elvis Costello [and] Rosanne Cash … John never lonely.’ – The Times (UK) Richards and Trombone Shorty. READINGS MONTHLY 23 April 2018

Philip Glass: Complete Études new chapter of recordings. Making their Classical for Solo Piano first appearance on the Decca Classics Sally Whitwell Australia label, they have recorded the ABC Classics. 4816592. 2 CDs $21.95 music of the two greatest protagonists in Music the French Impressionist movement: Pianist Sally Whitwell returns to the music of Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel. minimalist master Finally after all these years of reviews, I have a virtuosic viola Philip Glass, presenting Bernstein: Mass ALBUM OF album to review! The ‘King of Instruments’ (as it has been a monumental and Yannick Nézet-Séguin & The THE MONTH dubbed in certain circles), is often the considered the poor immersive journey for Philadelphia Orchestra solo piano. The Études – 20 in all, collected DG. 4835009. 2 CDs $24.95 Classical cousin to the violin but it has a beautifully resonant tone and this depth of sound makes it pleasing to the ears at all times. together into two Books – were written Jacqueline Kennedy This beautiful collection of pieces from the Baroque era over the course of two decades between commissioned Leonard shows off the German virtuoso Nils Mönkemeyer’s technical 1991 and 2012, and chart the musical Bernstein to compose and musical capabilities without ever making these difficult development of one of the most significant this massive work for the works sound even remotely challenging. composers of our generation. inauguration of the Kennedy Centre in New Bernstein: On the Waterfront York. Bernstein decided to write an This beautiful collection of pieces from Christian Lindberg & Royal innovative Mass and what came out is, say, a the Baroque era shows off the German Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra Catholic Mass getting out of hand. Unified virtuoso Nils Mönkemeyer’s technical BIS. BIS2278. $29.95 under his baton, Yannick Nézet-Séguin and musical capabilities In order to celebrate the forges a powerfully emotional interpretation centennial of of this unique work – a cross-section of Baroque: Music European and American Music. for Viola Many viola soloists can find it awkward to put together a Bernstein’s birth in 1918, Christian Lindberg has Nils Mönkemeyer full concert or album of works all originally written for viola so in the tradition of Bach himself, the J.S. Bach Cello Suite gathered music from Francesca Caccini: Sony Classical. 88985497332. $21.95 No. 5 has been rearranged for viola and theorbo. Now before five different La liberazione di Ruggiero productions spanning a period of 13 years Available 13 April you go running for the hills scared of what a theorbo is – it’s dall’isola d’Alcina just a lovely sounding, though extremely complicated kind – from Fancy Free to the iconic musical Paul Van Nevel & Huelgas Ensemble of guitar or lute. West Side Story. The Royal Liverpool Deutsche Harmonia Mundi. 889853387625. The opening work is by the relatively unknown Robert de Vise´e (from the courts of Philharmonic Orchestra clearly relishes $24.95 French kings Louis XIV and XV), and is simply delightful! The three short movements the opportunity to let its collective hair Paul Van Nevel and his start off with such French flair, that there is an interesting contrast to Bach’s now famous down. The players are egged on by Huelgas Ensemble have contrapuntal style (more than one melodic idea at the same time) which follows directly. Lindberg, known for his ability to energize recorded the first opera Then another interlude of French Baroque, with some Michel Lambert (whose daughter both orchestras and audiences. ever to be composed by went on to become the wife of the famous Jean-Baptiste Lully) before finishing with more a woman: Francesca Bach. Although Mönkemeyer has recorded a number of albums in the past, this is the first Alfred Schnittke & Arvo Pärt: Caccini’s La liberazione time that I have heard him perform and I will be searching through his back catalogue as Choral Works di Ruggiero dall’isola d’Alcina Paul Van I so enjoyed this lovely album. Kaspars Putninš & Estonian Nevel and his Huelgas Ensemble have fully engaged with this operatic jewel Kate Rockstrom is a friend of Readings Philharmonic Chamber Choir BIS. BIS2292. $29.95 from the Age of Baroque and revised the ‘The Estonians have score for its first complete recording. always rejoiced in a Compositionally, it reveals the transition Wayfaring Vocalise warm, rich sound and from Renaissance to Baroque. Umberto Clerici & Karin Schaupp Nuria Rial perfect blend, and ABC Classics. 4816811. Sony Classical. 88883754452. guided by the utterly $21.95 $19.95 precise and dynamic Classical Specials Wayfaring, a Heitor Villa- Kaspars Putninš they give here a truly collaboration Lobos dreamt outstanding rendition that picks up every of the Month between Italian- up the imaginative emotional and spiritual nuance with no Australian cellist combination of eight sacrifice of technical perfection … This Umberto Clerici and cellos and soprano work has been waiting for choirs able to German-Australian soloist. His famous do this, because the technical challenges Alleluia guitarist Karin composition for are not the most important thing about Julia Lezhneva Decca. 4785242. Was $26.95 Schaupp, traces a path ‘from birth to such an ensemble is Bachianas this music.’ – Gramophone death, with everything in between’. Brasileiras No. 5 – part vocalise and part $12.95 Limited Stock at this price Considering repertoire for solo cello and lament – based on the music of his native Gabrieli for Brass: ‘… a voice of bell-like guitar is scant, Wayfaring features a Brazil and J.S. Bach, and recently Venetian Extravaganza purity, even number of song transcriptions spanning recorded on Vocalise by heavenly Catalan Royal Academy of Music and throughout its from the early baroque to the present day, soprano Nuria Rial and the Cello Octet of Juilliard School Brass compass, immaculately rather than music originally intended for the Sinfonieorchester Basel. Vocalise Linn. CKD581. $29.95 fluent in coloratura ... that combination. The cello is an features the Villa-Lobos and more, This fascinating Though Il Giardino instrument capable of imitating the wails including the premiere recording of transatlantic musical Armonico’s punchy, adrenaline-fuelled and sighs of the human voice, and the Catalan composer Bernat Vivancos’s collaboration between playing may disconcert some in Mozart, plucked-string guitar provides sonorous beautiful (but oddly titled) ‘Vocal Ice’. It the brass players of they vividly complement a singer who contrast. Clerici and Schaupp, therefore, seems a strange premise for an album – a London’s Royal rivals the young Bartoli in high-octane are well-suited bedfellows. whole program of music for cello octet Academy of Music and virtuosity.’ – Gramophone I approached this recording with some and soprano – but, considering the rich New York’s Juilliard School presents trepidation, because Clerici and Schaupp and effulgent sound of the ensemble, I’m enduring masterpieces by Giovanni Peter Sculthorpe: have recorded a number of my favourite not complaining. Gabrieli and his Venetian contemporaries. The ABC Recordings songs, such as Ravel’s haunting Kaddisch, Until reviewing Vocalise and Under the direction of Reinhold Friedrich, Various and Schubert’s Frühlingstraum from Wayfaring I was unaware of Pablo Casal’s the players blend modern instruments ABC Classics. 4811293. Was $94.95 Wintereisse, and I have misgivings about plaintive arrangement of El Cant dels and intellect with 16th-century technique 10 CDs plus DVD meddling with already perfect music. Ocells (‘The Song of the Birds’), and I’m and tuning to excel in this profoundly $39.95 Limited stock at this price Do these songs – and others – have the glad now to have heard both versions. challenging repertoire. Peter Sculthorpe same impact when performed by a duo of The text suggests something optimistic symbolised and was the instruments other than voice and piano? – ‘Death is conquered, my life now Ravel & Debussy: voice of Australian Thankfully, yes. While Schaupp’s guitar begins!’ – although Casal’s music tells String Quartets classical music in the does not have the same resonance as a a darker story. Rial’s high, pure voice is Tinalley String Quartet same way Tom Roberts piano, and while Clerici’s cello can draw apt to sing the bittersweet words, and Decca. 4816906. $24.95 and Sidney Nolan out longer lines than the voice without the collectively melancholic sound of One of Australia’s most represent Australian art and Patrick White need of a breath, the combination suits the cellos, much like the combination of awarded and well- and Peter Carey Australian literature. This the simplicity of songs like Brahms’s Es guitar and cello, provides heartrending respected chamber 10CD deluxe boxed set brings together steht ein Lind, and the folksong ‘Wayfaring contrast. Vocalise is at once tormenting ensembles – the Tinalley Sculthorpe’s ABC recordings for the first Stranger’. A lovely, contemplative album. and joyful. String Quartet – has time to form a remarkable tribute to one of Alexandra Mathew is from Readings Carlton Alexandra Mathew is from Readings Carlton embarked on an exciting the world’s great composers.