Over the past few weeks, we’ve been compiling a host of gift guides to help you with your Christmas shopping. Jólabókaflóð (say it with us, yo-la-bok-a-flot) is the Icelandic tradition of exchanging books and chocolate with loved ones on Christmas Eve. It might be too hot for the blankets and fireplace snuggles of a Nordic Christmas here in Australia, but we’re very happy to embrace the gift of …

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Fed up with the relentless 24 hour news cycle? Dealing with a noisy family? Or maybe you have an extremely large pile of washing lurking in your peripheral vision… Whatever your predicament, sometimes you just need a great book to drown the world out. These 10 novels will help you take a well-deserved break from whatever minor chaos you’re facing. Ghosts by Dolly Alderton

Thirty-two-year-o…

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Over the next few weeks, we’ll be compiling a host of gift guides to help you with your Christmas shopping. Are you trying to reduce your impact on the planet? Do mass-produced and overpackaged gifts fill you with dread? Or maybe you’d quite like to use your gift-giving as an excuse to clear out your overflowing stash of glass jars… Here are six books that will give you all the inspiration you …

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A Promised Land by Barack Obama A Life on Our Planet by David Attenborough The Survivors by Jane Harper What Is to Be Done by Barry Jones All Our Shimmering Skies by Trent Dalton Ottolenghi FLAVOUR by Yotam Ottolenghi & Ixta Belfrage Death in Daylesford by Kerry Greenwood Watsonia: A Writing Life by Don Watson To Asia, with Love by Hetty McKinnon The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman

Barac…

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Love them or hate them – literary prizes are a great way to find books that have struck a chord with a panel of engaged and passionate readers. Here is a list of 30 literary prize winners from the past year for you to add to your TBR piles…

The Yield by Tara June Winch

Winner of the Miles Franklin Literary Award 2020

Knowing that he will soon die, Albert ‘Poppy’ Gondiwindi takes pen to pa…

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Christmas is less than a month away, but it’s not the season to be jolly for everyone. Here are our recommendations for those people who’d rather go hide under a rock than crack out the tinsel. Evil Geniuses by Kurt Andersen

As the social liberation of the 1960s finally ended in the chaos of Vietnam and Watergate, a faction of right-wing economic radicals were waiting, determined to claw ba…

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If you need something smart and more-ish to read in the warmer months, here are some of our best recommendations for smart summer reads of this year.

Earthlings by Sayaka Murata (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori)

If you aren’t afraid of confronting and taboo, then the new novel from the author of the cult hit Convenience Store Woman could be your ideal summer read. Natsuki lives a quiet…

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A Promised Land by Barack Obama Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart Watsonia: A Writing Life by Don Watson The Survivors by Jane Harper All Our Shimmering Skies by Trent Dalton Death in Daylesford by Kerry Greenwood What Is to Be Done by Barry Jones A Life on Our Planet by David Attenborough Ottolenghi FLAVOUR by Yotam Ottolenghi & Ixta Belfrage The Dressmaker’s Secret by Rosalie Ham

The first volu…

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Shore Leave by David Whish-Wilson

Frank Swann is not cut out for any kind of crime legwork anymore. He’s tired, he’s sick all the time, and nobody can figure out what it is that’s wrong with him. All he knows is he can’t get halfway through a conversation without feeling nauseous, but people are still knocking on his door all the time, asking for help. First, there’s the brothel owner needing …

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Prehistorians propose that the arrival of art in the timeline of humanity’s history indicates a jump in our cognitive abilities, so Readings is happy to present to you some wonderful art and design books from this year to delight, entertain, inform and help our cognitive skills expand and grow, as surely this year has asked of us.

Starting close by, The Garden State offers a look inside an inspi…

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