Our latest blog posts

What we're reading: Melissa Keil, Heather Taylor Johnson and Jessica Friedmann

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 Jean Harley Was Here by Heather Taylor Johnson

I read Jean Harley Was Here is one sitting. Heather Taylor Johnson tells the story of what happens to the friends and family in the aftermath of the titular character’s death. It’s a clever novel which somehow manages to avoid being overly emotional…

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Our top picks of the month for book clubs

For book clubs who devoured Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels

Flesh and Bone and Water by Luiza Sauma

Doctor André Cabral is living in London when he receives a letter from his home country, Brazil, which he left nearly 30 years ago. The letter prompts André to remember the days of his youth, including his secret infatuation with the intoxicating Luana. Unable to resist the pull of his memories, he embarks on a journey back to Brazil to rediscover his past…

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The Man Booker International Prize longlist 2017

The Man Booker International Prize has revealed the ‘Man Booker Dozen’ of 13 novels in contention for the 2017 prize, which celebrates the finest works of translated fiction from around the world.

The Man Booker International Prize is awarded every year for a single book, which is translated into English and published in the UK. Both novels and short-story collections are eligible. The work of translators is equally rewarded, with the £50,000 prize divided between the author and the translator…

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Hear from one of the contributors to They Cannot Take the Sky

They Cannot Take the Sky is a collection of first-person accounts of the reality of life in mandatory detention. It has been compiled and edited by Behind the Wire, an award-winning oral history organisation.

Amir Taghinia is a 23-year-old man who has been in immigration detention on Manus Island since 2013. His story appears in They Cannot Take the Sky, under the title ‘We are all convicted to live on this planet’. It is based on two long conversations…

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The Wellcome Book Prize shortlist 2017

The shortlist for this year’s Wellcome book prize has been announced. This prize is awarded annually to the best new work of fiction or non-fiction that ‘celebrates the topics of health and medicine in literature’.

The 2017 shortlist comprises four non-fiction and two fiction titles, including the first posthumously published title and the first translated title to be shortlisted for the prize.

Here is the full shortlist:

How to Survive a Plague by David France

When Breath Becomes Air by…

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Five reasons we love A Most Magical Girl by Karen Foxlee

by Leanne Hall

A Most Magical Girl by Karen Foxlee 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. It gave me that ‘Harry Potter feeling’.

From the first moment that 12-year-old Annabel Grey steps into Misses E & H Vine’s Magic Shop, the reader is aware that this girl’s life is about to change forever, and that almost everything she thought to be true is going to…

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Our top ten bestsellers of the week

First, We Make the Beast Beautiful by Sarah Wilson

Gut by Giulia Enders (translated by David Shaw)

The Barefoot Investor by Scott Pape

And Then I Found Me by Noel Tovey

The Dry by Jane Harper

The Girl Before by J.P. Delaney

Insomniac City by Bill Hayes

Why I am Not a Feminist by Jessa Crispin

Fight Like a Girl by Clementine Ford

South of Forgiveness by Thordis Elva and Tom Stranger

Our bestselling book of last week is First,

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What we're reading: Gabrielle Wang, Heather Taylor Johnson and Beci Orpin

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.

Leanne Hall is reading Little Paradise by Gabrielle Wang

I rarely re-read books – when you work in a bookshop there are so many tempting new titles that it’s difficult to go back and visit a favourite. But I did pick up the wonderful Little Paradise by Gabrielle Wang again last week, and it was…

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12 books to read in March

Jean Harley Was Here by Heather Taylor Johnson

A woman opens her car door, knocking a passing cyclist into the path of an oncoming van. The cyclist is Jean Harley. But this is not Jean’s story, nor is it the story of her death. It is the stories of the people she leaves behind. Heather Taylor Johnson’s Australian debut novel is fast becoming a staff favourite here at Readings, the kind of story that you can disappear inside of for…

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