VANESSA BERRY Mirror Sydney. Reviewed by Tom Patterson
A series of delightful anecdotes about Sydney Vanessa Berry sets out her brief in Mirror Sydney early. This book is a description of Sydney that doesn’t seek to describe its ‘natural beauty’ but instead focuses on the ‘marginalia, the overlooked and the odd’. To...
TONI JORDAN Our Tiny, Useless Hearts. Reviewed by Robin Elizabeth
If Toni Jordan were allowed to write a season of Dynasty, the result would be akin to Our Tiny, Useless Hearts. International bestselling, Indie Award-winning Toni Jordan’s fourth novel is a laugh-out-loud look at relationships, break-ups, breakdowns, and hook-ups....
JESSE BLACKADDER Sixty Seconds. Reviewed by Sally Nimon
Sixty Seconds gives a powerful insight into how ordinary people cope with extraordinary events. ‘Christ. The whole lot’s fucked. You think life is OK … but everything can go to shit in a second.’ And in those words lies the essence of Sixty Seconds. This book is not a...
SARAH BAILEY The Dark Lake. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm
A debut novel set in a small Australian town, The Dark Lake is a police procedural with a hefty dose of romantic tension. DS Gemma Woodstock and Rosalind Ryan went to the same school. Back then Woodstock was obsessed with Ryan, who seemed to have it all. From a...
ROSIE WATERLAND Every Lie I’ve Ever Told. Reviewed by Jessica Stewart
Rosie Waterland gives a clear-eyed reckoning of her life in this new memoir. In Every Lie I’ve Ever Told, Rosie Waterland tells stories from her ruptured childhood – first laid bare in her 2016 memoir The Anti-Cool Girl – interlacing them with intelligent, wickedly...
CASSIE LANE How to Dress a Dummy. Reviewed by Robin Elizabeth
How to Dress a Dummy speaks frankly of Cassie Lane’s battle for acceptance and will ring bells with many women. Cassie Lane is a former international model with a Masters in Creative Writing, but seems to be best known in Australia for dating AFL player Alan...
MEREDITH JAFFÉ The Making of Christina. Reviewed by Sally Nimon
The Making of Christina asks how well we know the people we love and if we can pay the price of truth. The Making of Christina is not a light read. Its subject matter is trauma, guilt and deceit. The result is neither pretty nor soothing, but this is not its intent....
Crime Scene: SULARI GENTILL Crossing the Lines. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm
Known for her Rowland Sinclair historical crime series and her YA Hero trilogy, Sulari Gentill delivers something very different with this new novel. What if you wrote of someone writing of you? In the end, which of you would be real? Crossing the Lines is an...
JULIE KOH Portable Curiosities. Reviewed by Ashley Kalagian Blunt
Portable Curiosities portrays a world of comic misery and brightly coloured heartache. Portable Curiosities, Julie Koh’s debut full-length short story collection (after a capsule collection, Capital Misfits), earned her a spot among 2017’s Sydney...
HANNAH KENT The Good People. Reviewed by Linda Funnell
With irresistible freshness and sympathy Hannah Kent renders a world that is both recognisable and eerily strange. Set in a remote village in County Kerry, Ireland, in the years 1825 and 1826, Hannah Kent’s second novel reiterates some of the themes of her first:...
ANNA SPARGO-RYAN The Gulf. Reviewed by Kylie Mason
The author of The Paper House returns with The Gulf, a moving tale of growing up before your time. ‘Can’t believe I met him in Big W. I mean, of all places. Just so romantic to bump into each other in the line. He let me go ahead of him, you know. Real gentleman...
Recent Posts
LYNNE OLSON The Sisterhood of Ravensbrück. Reviewed by Ann Skea10 July 2025Lynne Olson documents how, within the horror of a Nazi concentration camp, the [ … ]
SARAH GILBERT Unconventional Women: The story of the last Blessed Sacrament Sisters in Australia. Reviewed by Suzanne Marks8 July 2025Sarah Gilbert’s account of this religious order offers a rare insight into the [ … ]
JENNIFER MILLS Salvage. Reviewed by Robert Goodman3 July 2025The new novel from the author of Dyschronia and The Airways is climate fiction [ … ]
BELINDA LYONS-LEE The Haunting of Mr and Mrs Stevenson. Reviewed by Ann Skea1 July 2025The new novel from the author of Tussaud imagines what might have inspired [ … ]