ALICE HOFFMAN The Invisible Hour. Reviewed by Linda Godfrey
Best known for her Practical Magic series, Alice Hoffman delivers a time-travelling homage to the power of books in The Invisible Hour. This novel charts the lives of a mother and daughter and their search for independence and control over their lives. Ivy Jacob grows...
DAVID MARR Killing for country: A family story. Reviewed by Braham Dabscheck
David Marr’s account of his ancestors’ involvement with the Native Police and the murder of Aboriginal people is distressing and important. Several years ago, one of David Marr’s older relatives informed him that his great-great-grandfather Reginald...
SHELLEY PARKER-CHAN He Who Drowned the World. Reviewed by Amelia Dudley
Shelley Parker-Chan’s award-winning tale of an alternate ancient China continues in He Who Drowned the World. ‘… the most dangerous person in a game is the one nobody knows is playing.’ Dive back into the fascinatingly complex alternate ancient China of Shelley...
BRENDAN RITCHIE Eta Draconis. Reviewed by Ann Skea
Winner of the 2022 Dorothy Hewett Award, Brendan Ritchie’s third novel is set in a dystopian Western Australia, the landscape pummelled by meteor showers. Elora closed her eyes and waited for the flashes of light to dissolve. It took longer these days. Hours...
TOM BARAGWANATH Paper Cage. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm
A finalist in the Ngaio Awards for Best First Crime Novel, Paper Cage is the story of a divided community and a string of missing children. There’s not much that happens in Masterton that Lo Henry doesn’t know about. One of two Pākehā sisters who married...
SEBASTIAN FAULKS The Seventh Son. Reviewed by Ann Skea
Sebastian Faulks’ latest novel explores the consequences of amoral genetic research in a not-too-distant future. Alaric teaches disinterested children history in an English comprehensive school. … he enjoyed giving them an idea that the world had not always been as it...
FIONA SUSSMAN The Doctor’s Wife. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm
Fiona Sussman’s fifth novel pieces together a suspicious death, a fatal illness and erratic behaviour within a group of lifelong friends. Carmen Andino, Tibbie Lamb and Tibbie’s husband Austin have been friends since school. Austin and Tibbie got together, and...
TJ KLUNE Wolfsong and Ravensong: Green Creek Books 1 and 2. Reviewed by Amelia Dudley
TJ Klune’s werewolves challenge gender roles and showcase love and understanding among the bloodletting. ‘… even one such as you cannot live on rage alone.’ In Wolfsong, the first of TJ Klune’s Green Creek series, Oxnard’s father walks out one day,...
KATE FULLAGAR Bennelong and Phillip: A history unravelled. Reviewed by Braham Dabscheck
Kate Fullagar puts the lives of Wangal man Bennelong and Governor Arthur Phillip into a larger context beyond the brief years they spent together. What we regard as the modern history of Australia commenced with Britain establishing a colony in New South Wales in...
CHARITY NORMAN Remember Me. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm
A dementia diagnosis reveals clues to a decades-old mystery in this new novel from the author of The Secrets of Strangers – Charity Norman’s third to be shortlisted for NZ’s Ngaio Marsh Awards. In June 1994, 21-year old Emily Kirkland had been working at a petrol...
BRIOHNY DOYLE Why We Are Here. Reviewed by Sally Nimon
Briohny Doyle’s third novel explores the impact of multiple losses in a single life, exacerbated by the effects of the pandemic. ‘What should survive and how? And how do you know when survival has transpired?’ This is the central question posed in Why We Are Here, the...
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