Our latest blog posts

Recommended new kids' books in April

by Leanne Hall

This month, we recommend a crop of funny picture books, enough quality junior and middle fiction to last the school holidays, the best of the Easter books, and some very good-looking and fascinating non-fiction.

(Find our best recommendations for teen books this month here.)

PICTURE BOOKS

My Pictures After the Storm is a colourful and anarchic picture book that will please adults as much as children. Magic happens, someone cannonballs into the swimming pool, too many potato chips are…

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Recommended new YA books in April

by Leanne Hall

In April, teenagers ponder the impossible future in a bumper crop of Australian YA fiction, YouTube and TV stars take over the YA memoir genre, and some very classy international fantasy hits our shelves.

(Find our best recommendations for kids’ books this month here.)

LOVEOZYA PICKS

The impossibility of deciding on a future and moving into the freedom and potential of adulthood is explored in three very different, but equally excellent Australian YA novels this month.

The Secret Science

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What we're reading: Bill Hayes, Jenevieve Chang and Ariel Levy

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.

Amy Vuleta is reading Insomniac City by Bill Hayes

I’ve just started reading Insomniac City by Bill Hayes. This is a memoir of New York City, of insomnia and grief, of loss and love, and of the author’s relationship with the writer and neurologist, Oliver Sacks. I can already tell this is going to be…

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Q&A with Annie Smithers

by Chris Gordon

Chef, gardener and restaurateur Annie Smithers chats with our events manager Chris Gordon about her new cookbook, Annie’s Farmhouse Kitchen.

Your new cookbook is a collection of the menus you’ve cooked for your wonderful restaurant (du Fermier). I love this. How do you collect your ideas to pull such an such an impressive array of recipes together? Are you a note taker?

When I first thought of writing this book, it was because I had amassed a…

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Four delicious new cookbooks

by Chris Gordon

Our events manager Chris Gordon shares four cookbooks to love in April.

Also for foodies this month… Chris interviewed chef, gardener and restaurateur Annie Smithers, our staff tested out recipes from one of our favourite new cookbooks, and we’re offering 25% off a select range of our most popular cookbooks.

It’s Always About the Food by the Monday Morning Cooking Club

This group of delightful, passionate Jewish women decided to cook together every Monday morning 11 years ago, and…

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Terrific new crime reads out this month

by Fiona Hardy

CRIME BOOK OF THE MONTH

A Dangerous Crossing by Rachel Rhys

On a summer’s day in 1939, Lily Shepherd boards the cruise liner Orontes, gaining assisted passage to escape her bleak English life for the shores of Australia. She leaves behind a family stricken once by war, and alarmed by the idea of another – but Lily is positive no such thing will happen. She is also positive that the trip will be an adventure, yet not even the…

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Five reasons we love Squishy Taylor and the Bonus Sisters by Ailsa Wild

Squishy Taylor and the Bonus Sisters by Ailsa Wild (with illustrations by Ben Wood) is one of the six books shortlisted for this year’s Readings Children’s Book Prize. Here are five reasons why we think it’s brilliant.

1. Squishy Taylor is a terrific new Australian heroine for ages 6 and up.

We adore Squishy. She’s feisty and forthright, impulsive and inventive, silly and smart. Throughout this story, Squishy has to overcome all kinds of challenges and in doing so, lands…

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Read a love letter from Letters of Love

by Lian Hingee

The following letter is an extract from Letters of Love: Words from the heart penned by prominent Australians, published by Affirm Press in partnership with the Alannah & Madeline Foundation. All profits from book sales go directly to the Alannah & Madeline Foundation.

Dear Mae,

I was wishing for you before you even existed. When Mum told me that a new baby was going to join the family I wished for you. I wished for you on falling leaves…

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Mark's Say, April 2017

by Mark Rubbo

Last month I went to the opening of a rather marvellous and moving exhibition at Melbourne’s Immigration Museum. The exhibition, They Cannot Take the Sky is based on the book of the same name (edited by Michael Green, Angelica Neville, André Dao, Dana Affleck and Sienna Merope). Like the book, it’s been put together by a group of people with a lived experience of immigration detention. Twenty-four asylum seekers share their stories (through short videos and audio): their journeys, their…

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The Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction shortlist 2017

The shortlist for the 2017 Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction has been announced. This Prize celebrates excellence, originality and accessibility in women’s writing from throughout the world.

Here is the full shortlist:

Stay With Me by Ayòbámi Adébáyò

The Power by Naomi Alderman

The Dark Circle by Linda Grant

The Sport of Kings by C.E. Morgan

First Love by Gwendoline Riley

Do Not Say We Have Nothing by Madeleine Thien

The winner of the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction receives…

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