Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on, or the music we’re loving.

Nina Kenwood is reading Loner by Georgina Young (available August)

Loner is the winner of the 2019 Text Prize, and it sits right at the intersection of upper YA/adult fiction – it’s Daria meets Simmone Howell with a sprinkling of Sally Rooney. A slice-of-life kind of novel, Loner follows its main character, twenty-year-old…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on, or the music we’re loving.

Mark Rubbo is reading The Coal Curse: Resources, Climate and Australia’s Future by Judith Brett

I’ve just read The Coal Curse, the new Quarterly Essay from Judith Brett. This is a terrific analysis of Australia’s post war economy and of the adverse impact of the resources industry – the fossil fuel industry…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on, or the music we’re loving.

Tye Cattanach is reading The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

The Vanishing Half is Brit Bennett’s second novel and, like its predecessor The Mothers, does not disappoint. This cleverly constructed novel intrigues the reader from the very first page, drawing us into to its slowly unfolding story of family drama, fraught sibling…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on, or the music we’re loving.

Chris Somerville is reading Dear Friend, From My Life I Write to You in Your Life by Yiyun Li

Yiyun Li’s short collection of essays blends her interests in reading and writing with memoir. The book moves easily between discussions of, say, the short stories of Irish writer William Trevor, to her time…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on, or the music we’re loving.

Chris Gordon is reading The Mother Fault by Kate Mildenhall (available September)

I was kept wide awake last night because of bloody Kate Mildenhall’s forthcoming novel, The Mother Fault. Set in Australia in the near (but please god, let it not be so) future, this novel is a complete twist-in-your-gut kind of…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on, or the music we’re loving.

Tye Cattanach is reading The End of the World Is Bigger than Love by Davina Bell

Davina Bell has delivered a beautifully imagined, magical new fairy tale that exists in the same realm of sophisticated magical realism that brings to mind the extraordinary skill of writers who excel in the genre, the likes…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on, or the music we’re loving.

Chris Gordon is reading The Safe Place by Anna Downes

Do you need a novel to take you away from your couch and isolation? Perhaps a book that transports you somewhere warm, lush, tranquil even, while also introducing you to characters that are hanging onto their sanity by a thin thread? Look no…

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Our shops have reopened (with safety measures in place) and we’re pleased to be able to once again resume our regular what we’re reading column.

Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on, or the music we’re loving.

Mark Rubbo is reading Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman

Rutger Bregman’s Utopia for Realists was a breath of fresh air when it came out four years…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Tye Cattanach is reading Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

I’ve been lured into what might seem a daunting commitment (so many pages) by my wildly enthusiastic colleagues and my own curiosity. After all, it’s not every day I hear such glowing praise for historical fiction… What really got me across the line, was…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Ellen Cregan is reading The Confessions of Frannie Langton by Sara Collins

The Confessions of Frannie Langton was one of the winning books in this year’s Costa Book Awards. This is a big, intelligent bildungsroman-esque novel set in 1826 London. Frannie Langton is a mixed-race former slave who grew up in a…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Chris Gordon is reading Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton

I have fallen in love with Dolly Alderton – completely head-over-heels. I want to gift Everything I Know About Love to everyone that I love – already, I have made sure that my daughter and my best friend are reading it.

…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Bronte Coates is reading Blueberries by Ellena Savage (available March)

Back in 2017, I wrote about how much I loved Ellena Savage’s writing in a blog post rounding up some of the best non-fiction writing Readings staff had read by Australian women. At the time, I’d written: “Everything (Savage) writes makes me reconsider…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Bronte Coates is reading Exciting Times by Naoise Dolan (available April)

I recently got my hands on an early copy of this exciting fiction debut from Irish writer Naoise Dolan. Newly arrived in Hong Kong from Dublin, Ava meets Julian. They form – if not a relationship – an attachment of sorts. Then…

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Leanne Hall is reading Loveboat, Taipei by Abigail Hing Wen

The first thing you must know is that there are no actual boats in Loveboat, Taipei. ‘Loveboat’ (nicknamed after the TV show that we’d all rather forget … if we weren’t secretly watching clips of it on YouTube…) is a summer study…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Fiona Hardy is reading Shark Arm by Phillip Roope & Kevin Meagher

In 1935, a recently-caught tiger shark at the Coogee Aquarium vomited up a human arm in front of witnesses. The arm had on it a tattoo of two boxers facing off, and while the identity of its unfortunate owner was soon…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Bronte Coates is reading Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo (translated by Jamie Chang) (available late February)

I’ve been lucky enough to get my hands on an early copy of this novel from South Korean writer Cho Nam-Joo. The story of an ‘ordinary woman’ and the casually persistent sexism that she faces…

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Rosalind McClintock is reading Royals by Emma Forrest

Emma Forrest’s Royals is a book that twirls you around, swings you up into the air and then fells you at the knees, before pulling you up and doing it all again. It is a tale as old as time about two people from opposite…

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Dani Solomon is reading Our House Is on Fire by Jeanette Winter

Right now with the smoke from bushfires around the country choking Melbourne it’s so easy to fall into hopeless despair. What can we do? What can I do? How can I beat 200 bushfires? How can I help thousands of displaced…

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Our staff share the books they’re planning to read over summer.

“I’ve just nabbed a copy of The Topeka School on the enthusiastic recommendation of Alison, our head book buyer, and can’t wait to read it. She thinks it’s going to win all the awards, and I want to be in front of all that so I can brag about reading it “months ago” when it does.”

– Fiona Hardy

“This summer I am very excited to read an advance…

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Megan Wood is reading Good Bones by Margaret Atwood

Good Bones is a fantastic collection of short narratives, speculative fiction, retellings and musings that are classic Margaret Atwood. 27 separate works fill this 153 page book, but each delivers a punch and takes you on its own journey. Whether you’re being greeted from…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Tye Cattanach is reading Invisible in a Bright Light by Sally Gardner

Sally Gardner is a true master at weaving immensely deep worlds in which a reader can only get hopelessly absorbed. This new fairytale-esque offering is no exception. Beautifully written and gorgeously imagined, Invisible in a Bright Light is a sophisticated read…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Leanne Hall is reading Lair of Dreams (The Diviners, Book 2) by Libba Bray

I’m exactly halfway through the second book in the Diviners series by Libba Bray, Lair of Dreams, and it’s so wonderful I’m in no rush to get through the second half. This series is like a…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Jason Austin is reading The Son by Philipp Meyer

I’ve had a copy of The Son by Philipp Meyer sitting on my ‘to read’ bookcase for a while. I’ve been prompted to get on to it as it was adapted into a TV series last year starring Pierce Brosnan, and now both the…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Chris Gordon is reading The Testaments by Margaret Atwood

There are some weeks where a television series will take over my life (thank you Succession) and during those periods, I simply can not follow two intense storylines at the same time and find myself reading magazine and articles online. Sometimes I need…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Mark Rubbo is reading Peace by Garry Disher

I’ve been reading Peace by Garry Disher which is a sequel of sorts to his award-winning 2015 novel, Bitter Wash Road. Paul Hirschhausen has been demoted to a one-cop town in country South Australia and he has been called to investigate a bizarre and…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Tye Cattanach is reading The Passion by Jeanette Winterson

I picked up this slim little volume after reading Winterson’s The Daylight Gate and finding myself ruined for reading anyone else for the time being. It seemed only sensible to work my way through the extensive backlist I had yet to read.

The Passion…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Leanne Hall is reading The Republic of Birds by Jessica Miller (available March 2020)

I have just finished reading The Republic of Birds, the second middle grade novel by Berlin-based Australian author Jessica Miller. It isn’t out until March 2020, so I’m truly sorry to be taunting you early, but I have…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Ellen Cregan is reading The Secret Commonwealth (The Book of Dust, Volume 2) by Philip Pullman

I’ve been reading the second installment in Phillip Pullman’s The Book of Dust trilogy, which only came out a couple of weeks ago. I am a huge fan of Pullman’s writing, and was very excited…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Chris Gordon is reading Give Me Your Hand by Megan Abbott

Late to the game, I have finally joined my colleagues in their love for Megan Abbott. I’m reading Give Me Your Hand. It’s a story about female friendship that I know is about to go terribly wrong. Abbott is a…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Fiona Hardy is reading Bad Blood by John Carreyrou

My usual reading diet consists of kids books and crime (I know, I know) but when I need to mix things up, I really love a non-bloodthirsty non-fiction book. Which makes it ironic, probably, that the one I’ve been eyeing off when customers buy…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Ele Jenkins is reading Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner

I just finished Lolly Willowes, a 1926 novel by Sylvia Townsend Warner. It’s a remarkable book, short and whimsical and deeply subversive. At age 47, Laura Willowes escapes the narrowly confined life of a spinster and flees to the countryside on a…

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Amanda Rayner is reading Glory and its Litany of Horrors by Fernanda Torres (translated by Eric M. B. Becker)

I’m currently reading Glory and its Litany of Horrors by Fernanda Torres, translated from the Portuguese by Eric M. B. Becker. Torres, whose previous book The End sold over 200, 000 copies in Brazil…

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Ellen Cregan is reading We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby

I’ve been reading We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby. This hilarious collection of essays makes for delightful reading – Irby is a comedian who runs the popular blog Bitches Gotta Eat, and her warts-and-all…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films we’re watching, the television shows we’re hooked on or the music we’re loving.

Bronte Coates is reading How to Make a Movie in Twelve Days by Fiona Hardy

This is exactly the kind of book I would have loved as a nerdy and creatively-fired-up child. After a year of planning and a bittersweet financial boon, Hayley is set to film her first ever professional horror film…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.

Georgia Brough is reading A Superior Spectre by Angela Meyer

Jeff is dying; slowly, painfully. He escapes from overcrowded, overheated Melbourne to the wilds of the Scottish highlands. In his possession is a tab – a device that allows him to jump back in time and live life through the eyes of a real person…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.

Paul Barr is listening to Ancora by Flook

This dynamic Anglo Irish band have not had a release since Haven in 2005. It’s now 2019 and they are back with a vengeance. All the original members are here. The flute/whistle playing is as wild as ever and the powerful acoustic grooves of guitar and bodhran…

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Bronte Coates is reading I Like to Watch: Arguing My Way Through the TV Revolution by Emily Nussbaum

Emily Nussbaum has long been a writer I admire so I was very excited to get stuck into her new book, I Like to Watch. This work brings together a collection of her reviews and profiles…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.

Mike Shuttleworth is reading The Salt Path by Raynor Winn

Right now I’m at home resting my right foot following surgery to remove a raw nerve. So it’s the perfect time to read the true story of a couple’s 1000-kilometre walk along England’s southwest coast. Sore feet are very the least of Raynor and Moth’s…

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Jeremy George is reading Uncontained: Digital Disconnection and the Experience of Time by Robert Hassan

I am currently reading Uncontained: Digital Disconnection and the Experience of Time by author and University of Melbourne professor Robert Hassan. The book chronicles Hassan’s five week passage aboard the containership Rossini, a journey undertaken with the aim to ‘detox’…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.

Declan Murphy is listening to Heroes to Zeros by The Beta Band

Finally available again on vinyl for the first time since 2004. This Britpop-era Scottish band produced brilliantly skewed pop music that set them both ahead and outside of their pack mates of the time. It goes without saying they sadly weren’t around for…

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Julia Jackson is reading An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

This isn’t the sort of book I’d normally pick up for myself, but I’m really enjoying An American Marriage. In case you didn’t know, Tayari Jones is this year’s winner of the Women’s Prize for Fiction. Lucky for us, she’s also coming to the…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.

Mike Shuttleworth is reading Voyages in the Underworld of Orpheus Black by Marcus Sedgwick, Julian Sedgwick and Alexis Deacon

I’m squeezing in Voyages in the Underworld of Orpheus Black, an illustrated novel for teenagers by brothers Marcus and Julian Sedgwick. Fittingly, it’s a dual narrative told by Harry, a young conscientious objector, whose brother…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.

Alison Huber is reading Rules for Visiting by Jessica Frances Kane

Rules for Visiting came across my desk at just the right time, and I read it in two sittings this week. The narrator, May, is a solitary figure who lives with her aging father in the house she grew up in. She is botanist…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.

Mark Rubbo is reading The Chain by Adrian McKinty

McKinty is the author of the cult crime novels featuring Belfast detective Sean Duffy. McKinty used to live in St Kilda (he reviewed frequently for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald) but has now moved to the US. The Chain is a departure from…

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Julia Jackson is reading What Red Was by Rosie Price

Look out world! Rosie Price has landed! Her debut novel, What Red Was, is an assured piece of writing. While she appears to enter familiar territory with Kate and Max’s close friendship, echoing the friendships between Sebastian and Charles (Brideshead Revisited) and…

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Georgia Brough is reading Wild by Cheryl Strayed

At 26, Cheryl Strayed’s life ended – her mother had passed away a month after a fatal cancer diagnosis. Within the next few years, Cheryl’s family had fallen apart, her marriage had disintegrated and she’d developed a dangerous heroin habit. Standing in line at the pharmacy, she…

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Ellen Cregan is reading Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

For the past five years, various, trusted sources have recommended Station Eleven to me. Last weekend, I finally got around to reading it and absolutely loved it. This book is the intersection of a few things I love in fiction: Shakespeare, pandemics and tough…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.

Mark Rubbo is reading The White Girl by Tony Birch

I’ve been reading The White Girl by Tony Birch. I love Tony’s work, and this is his best yet. Set in the sixties, an elderly Aboriginal woman fears that her pale-skinned granddaughter will be taken away from her. She will go to any lengths to…

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Mark Rubbo is reading Upheaval: How Nations Cope with Crisis and Change by Jared Diamond

I’ve been reading Upheaval: How Nations Cope with Crisis and Change by Jared Diamond. So far, the case studies I’ve read (Finland, Japan and Australia) are fascinating, although some of the facts don’t quite jell. Diamond has a theory to…

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Each week we bring you a sample of the books we’re reading, the films and TV shows we’re watching, and the music we’re listening to.

Chris Gordon is reading A Universe of Sufficient Size by Miriam Sved

The Hungarian people have had their hearts ripped out of their country for years, but yet they have retained a wonderful pride in their heritage. I’m married to a second generation Hungarian and this is what I’ve learnt about Hungarians; that innate mentioned…

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