Our book advice column is back, and so is our wise and learned bookseller Agatha, who is ready to answer all your tricky (book-related) questions. If you have a question for Agatha please email askagatha@readings.com.au.

Dear Agatha I’m seeing more and more of my friends switch to KeepCups and beeswax wraps, while I am still out here filling up bins with Styrofoam noodle cups. I know I sh…

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We’re proud as punch of our marketing manager, Nina Kenwood, and her brand-new debut Young Adult novel (and winner of the 2018 Text Prize) It Sounded Better in My Head. If you love warm, big-hearted, hilarious and painfully relatable stories about growing up, first loves and that strange period in between school and uni, then It Sounded Better in My Head is the book for you. Readings staff are a…

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Three Women by Lisa Taddeo Too Much Lip by Melissa Lucashenko Dark Emu by Bruce Pascoe Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton Sing This at My Funeral: A Memoir of Fathers and Sons by David Slucki Normal People by Sally Rooney The Art of Growing Up by John Marsden Harry Seidler’s Umbrella by Joe Rollo Plots and Prayers by Niki Savva The Erratics by Vicki Laveau-Harvie

It’s a joy to see readers c…

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Jess Johnson, a much-valued member of our 2018–2019 Teen Advisory Board, reflects in this special guest blog post on the fantasy books that sparked her love of reading.

I will never fail to be amazed by how authors can create an entire world – planned to minute details – within a few hundred pages. By the time you put down the novel, it seems like that world is a real possibility and that some…

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The 117-Storey Treehouse by Andy Griffiths and Terry Denton I Am Change by Suzy Zail Young Dark Emu by Bruce Pascoe The World’s Worst Teachers by David Walliams My Unicorn Farts Glitter by Suzanne Barton and Shannon Horsfall Stone Girl by Eleni Hale As Happy as Here by Jane Godwin Sick Bay by Nova Weetman Graveyard Shift in Ghost Town by Michael Pryor The Good Thieves by Katherine Rundell

Our …

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Is non-fiction your thing? Pick up a copy of the August Readings Monthly (online or from one of our stores) or check out the list below for our top recommendations this month. We’ve got everything from stirring biography to music memoir to a comprehensive collection of scripts from an Aussie comedian. Happy reading! Mad As Hell and Back by Shaun Micallef and Gary McCaffrie

Shaun Micallef is…

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The purpose of the Teen Advisory Board is to give young people between the ages of 14 and 19 the opportunity to learn more about books, authors, and the book industry. Find out more here.

In late July, we were delighted to welcome a new group of teens who will be on the advisory board until June 2020. It was, as always, a very difficult decision to choose the final shortlist for the board, but…

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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.

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 boo…

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For a unique Australian novel, try… Dolores by Lauren Aimee Curtis

A young girl – sixteen, dehydrated, pregnant – collapses on the doorstep of a convent in the hills. Taking the runaway in, the nuns rename her ‘Dolores’. This novel, which our reviewer described as having ‘an otherworldly sheen’, is short, but rich. Dolores' narrative, which oscillates between her new life at the convent and t…

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August sees us awash in sharp and timely contemporary fiction, darker witchy and dystopic tales, and looking forward to a busy teen-friendly events schedule. Find our August picks for kids books here. YA BOOK OF THE MONTH

It Sounded Better In My Head by Nina Kenwood

Eighteen-year-old Natalie has just finished year twelve and is enjoying one final summer with her best friends Zach and L…

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