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.

Emily is reading How Should A Person Be? by Sheila Heti

I was given Sheila Heti’s How Should A Person Be? for Christmas from a friend at work. When working with books, it’s always quite a challenge to select a book for a colleague that they haven’t yet read. However, somehow this book had slipped under my radar despite it being named a best book of the year by The New York Times Book Review, The New Yorker, Salon and The Huffington Post to name a few.

Initially this book irritated me in the same way as Woody Allen’s films focusing on its characters neuroses often do. How Should A Person Be? seemed to be an odd mélange of memoir, fiction, centring on the self-absorbed friendship between artist Margaux and playwright Sheila with a few blow-jobs on the side! However as I read on, it struck me that maybe the petty subject matter irritated me because I actually related to it. I’d even experienced a similar scenario to one in the book: Sheila buys the same dress as Margaux, crossing the line of their friendship.

And just when I began to think the book was bordering on being twee, the focus shifted from the personal anxieties of a close- knit group of artists towards broader questions of what is ‘beauty’ and the quest for ‘truth’. The novel begins and ends with an ‘ugly painting competition’ started by Margaux with her friend Sholem.

Does a person have to be moral to produce art or can a person sometimes just articulate their own triteness? Should art always be an extension of an unquestioned project to make oneself and one’s world beautiful? Should the quest begin with the question ‘how should a person be’, or will that always result in self-indulgence?

Sheila’s friends (based on her real group of artist friends in Toronto) attempt to help her answer her questions along the way. And while this book thankfully doesn’t answer the question it sets up, it’s an interesting exploration of the questions we often ask ourselves.

Chris is reading The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon

Only because I have teenagers did I buy with glee The Bone Season. This wonderful fantastical romp has a strong female lead and is kind of like the Hunger Games meets the City series. Truly the author is not much older than my kids and she has pulled together worlds upon worlds, struggles against struggles, all with a hint of teenage angst. I’m just doing my duty as a parent reading what the kids are reading, but first I will need to pass on my copy to my best friend before I hand it over to my fifteen year old.

An entertaining escape from our world to another.

Mark is reading Inside Trader by Trader Faulkner

I’ve just finishing reading Trader Faulkner’s Inside Trader, published by Scribe.

Trader was an Australian actor who went to England in the 50s to pursue a career. He never made the big time but worked with many of British theatre’s great actors and companies. His stories about John Gielgud, Lawrence Olivier, Richard Burton, and Vivien Leigh are charming and often hilarious. His passion for flamenco and Spain introduced him to a whole new world of experience, even dancing for Picasso.

Bronte is reading The Girl with All the Gifts by M. R. Carey

I’m about 100 pages in and The Girl with All the Gifts, described as ‘Kazuo Ishiguro meets The Walking Dead’, is turning out to be a seriously addictive page-turner.

Melanie is a little girl who goes to school and loves books. She also happens to live in a cell at an army base, and is regularly muzzled and chained to her desk. I don’t want to give away too much about where this story is headed (following the unravelling of this shifting plot is very enjoyable) but if you’re interesting in reading just a little bit more about the premise before committing, take a look at this review on The Guardian.

Suzanne is reading Colour: Travels Through the Paintbox by Victoria Finlay

I’ve been hit with the decorating and crafting bug over the past few weeks. So apart from being surrounded by an array of interesting interiors, gardening and craft titles - of which a few favourites might be: A Place Called Home, New Zealand Interior Style, Cultivating Modernism, The Edible Balcony, Weekend Sewing and Printing by Hand - the book I’ve been drawn back to reading rather than using as inspiration for my projects is Colour: Travels through the Paintbox.

On a work trip to Melbourne, Finlay came across an art history text identifying different shades of colour and how they were once found - realising these same materials were now listed as dangerous or poisonous. She recalls as a child looking in wonder at the stained glass window of a cathedral and thinking that one day she would “find out ‘about the colours’” and in this book she does just that. The reader is taken across the globe, and back in time to when pigments were first being discovered by artisans and a new, exciting palette was opening up.

I’d recommend this book to anyone interested in art, history or travel as Finlay has catered for all of us.