Our books of the month, November 2023
Explore our books of the month for November; each of the below titles has been read and recommended by our booksellers before being selected as our book of the month for its category.
FICTION BOOK OF THE MONTH
Women & Children by Tony Birch
Reviewed by Ruby Grinter, Readings Carlton
'Tony Birch crafts a story that perfectly encapsulates the innocence of childhood, and the creeping recognition of how the world ignores the voices of women and girls.'
Lovely, mischievous Joe Cluny is living in 1960s Melbourne with his older sister, Ruby, and their mother, Marion. Ruby has gone away to the country for a few weeks, and Joe must spend his days with his grandfather, Charlie (‘Char’), cleaning the eclectic collection of objects Charlie has acquired. Everything is normal, until Joe’s aunt, Oona, appears on the doorstep – bruised and in need. Joe knows Marion and Oona need help, yet no one will give it to them.
Tony Birch crafts a story that perfectly encapsulates the innocence of childhood, and the creeping recognition of how the world ignores the voices of women and girls. Birch takes care to give us a loving, inquisitive, uncertain boy in the form of Joe; one that Birch uses to exemplify the phase before some boys become ‘damaged men’. Ruby features as a resilient, fiercely caring, intelligent girl – loving and annoying her brother just the right amount.
Full of religious devotion and doubt, Women & Children studies the way we interact with faith, and the way faith can be weaponised against us. Charlie becomes the medium through which Joe begins to question what he has been taught. Seeing Charlie as a grandfather, father, and friend is also how Joe begins to piece together his understanding of what it is to be a man.
The ease with which Birch tells stories means appreciating this book is as easy as breathing. A standout feature is the brutally honest relationship between sisters Marion and Oona – both women face a world of misogyny almost alone, yet they remain painfully brave and caring. Women & Children is a bloody reminder that a loving family will fight tooth and nail to see you safe, and Birch is adamant we understand how entirely unacceptable ignorance – or complacency – is.
CRIME BOOK OF THE MONTH
The Mantis by Kotaro Isaka & Sam Malissa (trans.)
Reviewed by Joe Murray, Readings Kids
'... a thrilling and endearing tale about a man trapped between two worlds and searching for an escape.'
Kabuto lives a double life: one as a loving father and dutiful husband, the other as a cold-blooded contract killer. Only one of those lives is terrifying – the other is just murder for hire. Trouble is, Kabuto wants out of the game: he’s tired of the bloodshed and can barely stomach killing other professionals, let alone the innocent. Leaving the criminal underworld is classically a very risky move, but it’s especially difficult when he also has to make sure his wife’s happy and his son’s on the right path. He’s going to need all his wits about him, and then some.
Told in a series of episodic vignettes, The Mantis is a wonderful chameleon of a novel, equally capable of being gripping, amusing and poignant, whether it’s describing a high-stakes conversation at the dinner table or a matter-of-fact fist fight. Kabuto is a brilliantly contradictory character, lethally competent but socially hapless, anxiously devoted to never upsetting his wife but perfectly capable of keeping his biggest secret from her. It’s a testament to Kotaro Isaka’s writing that it’s impossible not to root for Kabuto.
Throughout the novel, the dramas of everyday life, from hornet nests to parent–teacher conferences, are perfectly juxtaposed with the cut-throat Tokyo underworld that fans of Isaka’s earlier novels will be immediately familiar with. It’s a juxtaposition which produces a humour and lightness that never threatens to undercut the emotional stakes. Isaka will make you smile and then he’ll make your stomach drop – that’s just the way the business goes.
The Mantis is a thrilling and endearing tale about a man trapped between two worlds and searching for an escape. It’s perfect for anyone who likes their family dramas with a little bit of murder on the side.
NONFICTION BOOK OF THE MONTH
Question 7 by Richard Flanagan
Reviewed Joe Murray, Readings Kids
'The ideas shine, the prose dazzles, but is that really a surprise? In truth, Question 7 cannot be fully captured by any writing except its own: like any magic trick, you must see it for yourself.'
Sometimes, a work of nonfiction feels like a magic trick. While novels can weave poignant, transcendent stories from little more than an author’s imagination, it is something entirely different, something almost miraculous, when that same transcendence is wrought from the stony face of fact and history, when the reality of memories and moments and lives is somehow coalesced into a thing more beautiful than the sum of its parts. Richard Flanagan’s Question 7 is that magic trick made manifest, a profound journey that draws its meandering path through tragedies great and small, from the skies above Hiroshima to the rivers of Tasmania.
Preoccupied, like so many others in recent years, with the staggering atrocities of nuclear warfare and informed by the timeless fourth tense used in the language of the Yolngu people, Flanagan’s writing spirals outwards from that grim morning in August when they dropped the bomb, effortlessly ‘confounding’ time to link each fragment of history responsible for our present. Before Hiroshima, there was Leo Szilard, the first scientist to see the destructive potential of nuclear chain reactions, who was in turn inspired by H.G. Wells, whose imagination created the first visions of the atomic bomb. After Hiroshima is Flanagan himself, born of a father whose life, as a Japanese prisoner of war, was saved by the blast that killed countless others. From Wells to Szilard to Hiroshima to father to son – Flanagan presents history as a line of cause and effect that becomes a circle when inscribed on the land of Tasmania, whose bloody history of attempted genocide inspires one author who in turn, births another, haunted by that same genocide. In the words that echo throughout the book: ‘life is always happening and has happened and will happen.’
There’s more in this magnificent work I haven’t mentioned: questions of love and Chekhov, memories that animate and contextualise Flanagan’s fiction, and impassioned calls for unity and resistance alike. The ideas shine, the prose dazzles, but is that really a surprise? In truth, Question 7 cannot be fully captured by any writing except its own: like any magic trick, you must see it for yourself.
KIDS BOOK OF THE MONTH
Kimmi: Queen of the Dingoes by Favel Parrett
Reviewed by Alexa Dretzke, Readings Hawthorn
'Kimmi opens like the beginnings of a bush ballad, a mellifluous cadence introducing the reader to a tiny Tropical dingo ...'
Kimmi is a companion book to the moving Wandi, who was an Alpine dingo rescued as a pup when he fell from the sky (literally!). Kimmi opens like the beginnings of a bush ballad, a mellifluous cadence introducing the reader to a tiny Tropical dingo, the only girl pup in a litter of four, all of whom are protected by her mum and aunt. There are dangers everywhere and, to survive, these magnificent creatures now need humans to protect them – one of the species that has contributed to their near demise!
Will Kimmi have to leave the only home she has known in her short life and be parted from her family to survive? She comes to learn that no matter where life takes her, she will always be connected to her ancestors, ‘who have walked the red earth for thousands of years’.
These lovely hardbacks are small gems that will be appreciated by readers aged 7+.
KIDS CLASSIC OF THE MONTH
Finn Family Moomintroll by Tove Jansson & Elizabeth Portch (trans.)
Reviewed by Kim Gruschow, Readings St Kilda
'The moomins are thoughtful, philosophical creatures; at times they are mischievous, but never mean-spirited. Finn Family Moomintroll is filled with Jansson’s frank, charming Scandinavian humour and features many of her beautiful illustrations.'
While I’d hate to imply that I was deprived, I do feel some sadness that I only learned about the Moomins after my childhood had ended, when I began working at a children’s bookshop at 20 and was introduced to Tove Jansson’s incredible body of work by my colleagues. Finn Family Moomintroll is one of the nine novels Jansson wrote featuring the Moomintrolls and their community of strange critters.
It opens as winter ends. The sun is out, everyone is waking up from a long sleep, and it is time for adventure. On the one hand, this is a book filled with action; there is magic, mysteries, and a voyage to a secret island. There is a cave and a party, there are dangers and delights to be found on each and every page. In saying that, the book is gentle. The moomins are thoughtful, philosophical creatures; at times they are mischievous, but never mean-spirited. Finn Family Moomintroll is filled with Jansson’s frank, charming Scandinavian humour and features many of her beautiful illustrations. It’s a book that would be suited to independent readers aged 9+, although the novel is split into seven chapters, each with a distinct plot, making it an excellent choice for sharing with a wider age range of family members at bedtime. Please do not deprive yourself or the young readers in your life of the Moomintrolls any longer!
YOUNG ADULT BOOK OF THE MONTH
What the River Knows by Isabel Ibañez
Reviewed by Aurelia Orr, Readings Kids
'Death on the Nile meets The Mummy in this enchanting adventure that captures the lengths to which people would go to discover the truth, and the price they paid for that knowledge.'
Set in 19th century Buenos Aires, Inez yearns for her parents, whose long travels to Egypt make her believe their love for a faraway land is greater than their love for their daughter. But when she receives a letter saying that her parents have gone missing and are presumed dead, she has no hesitation in boarding the first ship to Egypt. Upon arriving, she meets a number of new people: an uncle, who is adamant she be sent back home; her uncle’s assistant, who possesses a devilish charm and secrets of his own; a crew of archaeologists; British ambassadors; and more. All of these people are on the hunt to unearth the greatest Egyptian mystery of all: the missing tomb of Cleopatra, the last pharaoh.
When Inez begins to see visions of Cleopatra, and finds past memories trapped in objects by the touch of magic, she pieces together the clues of her parents’ demise. She also learns that some people are, like the River Nile, glittering and beautiful on the surface, but hiding monsters lurking beneath.
As an ancient history lover, I adored that this book showcased how politically, militaristically, and linguistically intelligent and well-educated Cleopatra was. Through Inez’s visions, we see how the stories of women in history have been manipulated and changed, and how we owe it to them to bring the truth to light.
Death on the Nile meets The Mummy in this enchanting adventure that captures the lengths to which people would go to discover the truth, and the price they paid for that knowledge. For ages 13+.