(courtesy Allen & Unwin Book Publishers) In recent years, there has a been near-chronological avalanche of stories that make merry with ideas of time and space and use our increasing understanding of how these two concepts work and interact to spin some incredibly involved and immersively beguiling storytelling. Having someone Continue Reading
Books
Book review: Service Model by Adrian Tchaikovsky
(courtesy Pan Macmillan Australia) There a re a great many superstars of the literary sci-fi genre, authors whose minds not only go there but who are then, almost miraculously, able to take their wildly imaginative musings and doing something profoundly impressive them. One of the leading stars of this pantheon Continue Reading
#ChristmasInJuly book review: The Gingerbread Café by Anita Faulkner
(courtesy Hachette Australia) As someone who grew up incredibly socially isolated thanks to incessant bullying from the first day of school until almost the last, this reviewer appreciates a story in which something similarly cut out of the mainstream finds their way into a place of belonging and the unconditional Continue Reading
Book review: Hurdy Gurdy by Jenny Ackland
(courtesy Allen & Unwin Book Publishers) The way the world is going at the moment, you would have to be the hardiest and perkiest of optimists to think that the way forward is strewn with anything but death, disaster and destruction. Fascists are making their cruelly odious presence felt around Continue Reading
Book review: How to Age Disgracefully by Clare Pooley
(courtesy Penguin Books Australia) The past, we many of us know all too well, very rarely stays snugs and safely in the past. Whether we carry past scars with us or the law or estranged family members or a host of other things catch up with us, the past has Continue Reading
#ChristmasInJuly book review: Mistletoe at Moonstone Lake by Holly Martin
Ah, the magic of Christmas. If you’re in the northern hemisphere, which is where, of course, all the traditional Christmas visuals and vibe comes from, it’s the most wonderful time of the year, the season when reality takes a much welcome hike and all the travails and sadness of the Continue Reading
During #ChristmasInJuly 2024 I decorated my tree with 10 pop culture ornaments incl. Popeye, Grover, 101 Dalmatians, Winnie the Pooh, Garfield, The Partridge Family + more
(courtesy IMP Awards) Yes, my friends, I put up a Christmas in July tree. Well, to be fair, it’s a plain white tree that sits on a table in our loungeroom all year round and which is bedecked in Christmas ornaments in July and December (and yes, just into February Continue Reading
Book review: Juno Loves Legs by Karl Geary
(courtesy Penguin Books Australia) Not a lot goes right in life for the two titular characters at the heart of Karl Geary’s arrestingly moving novel, Juno Loves Legs. Born into poverty in 1970s Dublin, they are both well and truly up against from the get-go in their economically deprived estate; Continue Reading
UPCOMING READ: The Beforelife of Eliza Valentine by Laura Pearson
(courtesy official Laura Pearson Twitter/X account) YOU’VE HEARD OF THE AFTERLIFE. WELCOME TO THE BEFORELIFE. There are four of us: Samuel, Lucy, Thomas, and me – Eliza. We came into being the day Becca Valentine was born. We’ve been by her side ever since. What she doesn’t know yet, is Continue Reading
Book review: The Summer Job by Lizzy Dent
(courtesy Penguin Books Australia) You have to hand it to romantic comedies (which, by the way, this reviewer adores) – they often have the most outrageously out-there premises that, somehow, in the hands of an accomplished writer, end up feeling grounded and human. It takes some talent for that to Continue Reading