by NRB | 21 Nov 2024 | Fiction |
Minette Walters’ new historical novel features a consummate spy in the aftermath of an ill-fated seventeenth-century English rebellion. A man of Royal descent stepped ashore this day in our fair port of Lyme Regis. Handsomely attired, he declared himself to be Duke of...
by NRB | 14 Nov 2024 | Fiction |
The author of Love Objects and An Isolated Incident turns to historical fiction to tell the story of a young ninth-century woman whose quest for knowledge will not be denied. Rapture is a romance. Not just because it follows the love and passion of an unconventional...
by NRB | 12 Nov 2024 | Fiction |
Rodney Hall has won the Miles Franklin Award twice (Just Relations, The Grisly Wife); his new novel is a panoramic alternative history of the twentieth century. Queen Elizabeth II visited Brisbane on 9 March 1954 as part of her longest-ever Commonwealth tour. A...
by NRB | 10 Oct 2024 | Fiction |
Harriet Constable’s debut novel takes inspiration from a real-life Venetian prodigy who was both a student of and rival to Vivaldi. Anna Maria della Pietà is destined for greatness. At eight, she knows it as surely as string knows bow, as lightning knows storm, as...
by NRB | 4 Jun 2024 | Fiction |
The protagonist of Natalie Bayley’s novel embarks on an unusual and increasingly dangerous quest to honour the brother she lost in childhood. They are hanging me tomorrow … Each second is an eternity. I cannot sleep, I cannot eat. I lie wretched on the bed while...
by NRB | 30 May 2024 | Fiction |
Set in 17th-century London, Lauren Chater’s new novel brings together a royal artist, a young woman’s quest and the real-life Anne Hyde. What do you do if the king invites you to share his bed but you find the idea repulsive? A wave of nausea ripples through her...
by NRB | 23 May 2024 | Fiction |
The bestselling creator of the Grishaverse turns to the history of 16th-century Spain for this story of a young woman with magical powers. If the bread hadn’t burned, this would be a very different story. So it would. Luzia would not have used her magical skills, Doña...
by NRB | 24 Apr 2024 | Fiction |
Kevin Jared Hosein’s debut novel is both a mystery story and a window into the lives of Caribbean indentured labourers and their families. The place is Trinidad, ‘sometime in the 1940s’. Four boys ventured to the river bank to perform a blood oath. Two brothers...
by NRB | 20 Mar 2024 | Fiction |
Through the story of Matilda, Robyn Bishop’s novel reveals the constrained lives of women in rural New South Wales in the late 1800s. It is July 1892 and Matilda is just old enough to help Clara out of her cot, change her nappy and dress her, but not old enough to...
by NRB | 13 Mar 2024 | Fiction |
Tracy Ryan’s latest novel evokes the social divisions of sixteenth-century France and the stories of two independent-minded women. In The Queen’s Apprenticeship, Tracy Ryan tells the stories of two women. One, Jehane/Josse, the daughter of a journeyman printer who...
by NRB | 1 Feb 2024 | Fiction |
Robyn Cadwallader’s third novel is set against the anti-Semitism of the thirteenth century and England’s expulsion of the Jews. ‘What you doing there, girl? Why stand and shiver when the sun shines? You must’ve heard the story of Little Hugh before. They recite it...
by NRB | 25 Jan 2024 | Fiction |
Jennifer Mackenzie Dunbar’s new novel is inspired by the real-life discovery of a hoard of priceless chess pieces on a remote Scottish island. Directly in front of her, the queen held her hand against her cheek, as if aghast. ‘What have you seen?’ Marianne whispered,...
JUNE WRIGHT Mother Paul series. Reviewed by Karen Chisholm6 December 2024June Wright has faded from view, but in 1948 her novel Murder in the Telephone [ … ]
ANDREW O’HAGAN Caledonian Road. Reviewed by Catherine Pardey5 December 2024This new novel from the author of Mayflies is set in London, but Glasgow is [ … ]
IAIN RYAN The Dream. Reviewed by Ben Ford Smith3 December 2024Iain Ryan’s latest novel continues his fascination with 1980s Queensland and [ … ]
MARINA YUSZCZUK Thirst. Reviewed by Ann Skea28 November 2024Argentinian writer Marina Yuszczuk puts her twist on the vampire novel in [ … ]