EMILY MIDORIKAWA and EMMA CLAIRE SWEENEY A Secret Sisterhood: The Hidden Friendships of Austen, Bronte, Eliot and Woolf. Reviewed by Justine Ettler
From Charlotte Brontë and Elizabeth Gaskell to Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield, Midorikawa and Sweeney celebrate the friendships between women writers. I’ve heard people say that what ensures a writer’s continued productivity are things like having a...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on Hemingway revisited
We lay under cover by the side of the road for the ambush and Paco passed me the wineskin which was heavy with the resin-tasting wine of that part of the country which feels good when it hits the back of your throat in a spurt but you must be careful to cut the spurt...
EMILY BRONTË Wuthering Heights. Reviewed by Jean Bedford
Sophisticated narrative layering and emotional insight make Wuthering Heights an extraordinary novel. I believe Wuthering Heights to be one of the best (if not the best) English novels of the 19th century, possibly ever. I’ve read it perhaps 20 times, taught it in...
SUSAN JOHNSON The Landing. Reviewed by Robyne Young
This novel artfully articulates the search for the perfect self, the perfect emotional and sexual mate, and the perfect life. In the opening sentence of her new novel, The Landing, Susan Johnson pays homage to one of the greatest writers on love and matrimony, Jane...
BARBARA PYM. An appreciation by Michael Jongen
The revival of interest in Pym’s delightful comedies of manners is well-deserved. ‘Of course it’s all right for librarians to smell of drink.’ – Barbara Pym, Less Than Angels I came to Barbara Pym late, through reading many comparisons to EF Benson and Jane...
EDWARD ST AUBYN Lost for Words. Reviewed by Michael Jongen
This funny and satirical story will entertain those readers who take an interest in the politics of literary awards. Malcolm Craig, an MP who has time on his hands due to political misfortune, accepts the invitation to chair the judging of a literary award, on the...
VAL MCDERMID Northanger Abbey. Reviewed by Michael Jongen
Northanger Abbey reimagined by Val McDermid is a delight best read in a comfortable chair beside a raging fire on a cold and wet day. I found this novel satisfying on so many levels that it now sits with my favourite Austen pastiches – Death Comes to...DAMON YOUNG Philosophy in the Garden. Reviewed by James Tierney
This book invites readers to drink from a beautifully blended philosophical cup. Philosophers occupy a diffident space in Australian public life. No antipodean philosopher dominates debates here in the manner of Europeans like Slavoj Žižek or Bernard-Henri Lévy,...
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