JOHN CANN with JIMMY THOMSON The Last Snake Man. Reviewed by Ashley Kalagian Blunt
A dangerous way to make a living: John Cann’s autobiography tells the story of his life as a professional snake handler. George Cann was a snakey – a snake handler – all his life. His son John grew up to be a snakey too. One...
ADRIAN MCKINTY The Chain. Reviewed by Jessica Stewart
Adrian McKinty has won multiple awards for his crime novels featuring Belfast detective Sean Duffy. With The Chain he moves into new territory, producing a flat-out thriller. This is one hell of a ride. If you’re looking for a book to keep you up and turning the...
PAM MENZIES Port Kembla: A memoir. Reviewed by Pip Newling
In this lively and affectionate social history of place, Pam Menzies reveals Port Kembla to be both remarkable and ordinary – a driver of the nation as well as being, like so many places in Australia, on the receiving end of change and globalisation. The book is...
KATE MASCARENHAS The Psychology of Time Travel. Reviewed by Amelia Dudley
In this debut novel Kate Mascarenhas creates a world where time travel is not only possible, it could be linked to a murder … In 1967, four female scientists invent time travel, but only three of them become household names for the right reason. The fourth,...
ROB HART The Warehouse. Reviewed by Robert Goodman
Rob Hart’s dystopian novel about an online fulfilment warehouse describes a world that feels disturbingly familiar. Consumerism and the American Dream are in the firing line in Rob Hart’s debut novel The Warehouse. David Eggers mashed Google, Microsoft and Apple...
TANYA HEASLIP Alice to Prague and YONGEY MINGYUR RINPOCHE with HELEN TWORKOV In Love with the World. Reviewed by Ann Skea
These two memoirs of travel and dislocation present contrasting approaches to venturing into the unknown. Alice to Prague and In Love with the World are very different books with contrasting styles and perspectives and different stories to tell. Yet, fundamentally,...
JP POMARE Call Me Evie. Reviewed by Ashley Kalagian Blunt
Who is Evie? JP Pomare’s taut debut thriller has already been shortlisted for crime writing awards. A man holds a young girl against her will. She bolts, reaching the front door of the house, but the man catches up and drags her back inside. He forcibly...
PETER CORRIS See you at the Toxteth: The best of Cliff Hardy and Corris on crime. Reviewed by Robert Goodman
This collection gives an insight into a trailblazer who created one of the most enduring series in Australian crime fiction. It is hard to believe these days that there was ever a time when there was no market for Australian crime fiction. The strength, the range, the...
Exclusive Peter Corris extract
See you at the Toxteth: The best of Cliff Hardy and Corris on crime, published this week, brings together in one volume some of Peter Corris’s best short stories, selected by Jean Bedford, together with his ‘ABC of Crime Writing’ and a selection of...
OLIVER SACKS Everything in its Place: First Loves and Last Tales. Reviewed by Ann Skea
This second posthumous collection of essays again reveals the passions and intellectual range of the bestselling neurologist, Oliver Sacks. Those who knew of Oliver Sacks as the practising neurologist who wrote The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and...
JUDITH BRETT From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage: How Australia got Compulsory Voting. Reviewed by Bernard Whimpress
Australian politicians might rank low in public esteem but as this incisive book from Judith Brett reveals, our system of voting is admirable compared to the rest of the world’s democracies and certainly superior to those of the United Kingdom and the United States....
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