LYN DICKENS Salt Upon the Water. Reviewed by Ann Skea
Lyn Dickens’s award-winning debut novel of an independent woman in colonial South Australia explores prejudice, power and identity. Salt Upon the Water is an historical fiction; also, according to the blurb on the back cover, ‘an epic love story’. Both are true, but...
JOHN BANVILLE Venetian Vespers. Reviewed by Naomi Manuell
Set in Venice in 1899, John Banville’s new novel blends crime and the gothic as it skewers literary pretension. From 2006 to around 2020, Irish novelist John Banville began publishing crime fiction under the pseudonym Benjamin Black. The Man Booker Prize winner (and...
HEATHER ROSE A Great Act of Love. Reviewed by Ann Skea
The bestselling author of The Museum of Modern Love turns to historical fiction in her new novel set in convict-era Van Dieman’s Land. Do not be fooled by the cover of this book. In spite of the pretty young woman gazing at you through a tangle of ribbons and the...
MATTHEW HOOTON Everything Lost, Everything Found. Reviewed by Ann Skea
Longlisted for the 2025 ARA Historical Novel Prize, Matthew Hooton’s novel traces memories of Henry Ford’s experimental settlement in Brazil. I know my grandson, Nicholas, thinks of my personal history as an exaggeration or tall tale. And why shouldn’t he? He cannot...
LAURA ELVERY Nightingale. Reviewed by Ann Skea
Award-winning short story writer Laura Elvery’s first novel delivers a vivid portrait of Florence Nightingale and the horrors of war. Bodies fall apart. Things come to an end. Everyone wants to make me comfortable, I know that. How many times have I murmured...
TAN TWAN ENG The House of Doors. Reviewed by Catherine Pardey
Longlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize, Tan Twan Eng’s novel reimagines the events in Penang that inspired a famous Somerset Maugham story. Those familiar with Tan Twan Eng’s writing, and that of Somerset Maugham, will know they are in for pleasant reading when in...
BELINDA LYONS-LEE The Haunting of Mr and Mrs Stevenson. Reviewed by Ann Skea
The new novel from the author of Tussaud imagines what might have inspired Robert Louis Stevenson to write Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Have you ever looked closely at your wardrobe in the dark? Have you ever lain in bed, perhaps with the candle flickering on your bedside...
JO HARKIN The Pretender. Reviewed by Ann Skea
Jo Harkin’s novel is a fresh and rollicking take on the mystery of fifteenth-century pretender to the English throne, Lambert Simnel. Perhaps the best part of John’s life (and the funniest) is when he is still ‘a small village boy’, ‘short of words’ but full of...
KELLY GARDINER and SHARMINI KUMAR Miss Caroline Bingley Private Detective. Reviewed by Michael Jongen
Gardiner and Kumar give Caroline Bingley a larger and more exciting role than she ever had in Pride and Prejudice. Caroline Bingley’s unpopularity in Pride and Prejudice stems largely from her behaviour and motivations, which clash with the values celebrated in...
EMMA DONOGHUE The Paris Express. Reviewed by Justine Ettler
The new novel from the author of Room and Akin delivers an Agatha Christie feel, a historical train derailment, and identity politics. In the search for an original twist, some crime writers are turning to literary and experimental tropes like hybrid genres and...
FRANCESCA DE TORES Saltblood. Reviewed by Ann Skea
Francesca de Tores’ novel is swashbuckling historical fiction, featuring unconventional women, war, and piracy on the high seas. Francesca de Tores makes it clear from the start: Mary Read and Anne Bonny are real historical figures – but I am no historian. In...
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