Biography and memoir
Hello, Beautiful! by Hannie Rayson
Hannie Rayson is one of Australia’s most renowned and revered playwrights for stage and TV. Inheritance, Hotel Sorrento and Life after George all capture the quintessential contemporary Australian voice and as a result, have enjoyed successful seasons right across…
Schubert’s Winter Journey by Ian Bostridge
Sitting through a performance of Schubert’s Winterreise can be a harrowing experience. We follow the protagonist as he, in the darkness of night, embarks on a winter’s journey with only the light of the moon as his companion. Restlessly he…
Epilogue by Will Boast
This autobiography could have easily, and forgivably, been filled with indulgent analyses of grief, loss and growing up. It opens with Boast’s father dying, quietly and in isolation. Having already lost his mother and only brother, twenty-four-year-old Boast finds himself…
Not My Father’s Son by Alan Cumming
Not My Father’s Son is really a tale of two fathers: Alan Cumming’s own (forester Alex Cumming) and his maternal grandfather (WWII veteran Tommy Darling). In 2010, Alan is given an opportunity – through appearing in the BBC’s popular program…
The Girl Who Lived by Susan Jane Berg
Sunday 27 October, 1985. Susan was 15 years old and set out on a fishing trip in a boat with her mum, dad and older brother, Bill, on Westernport Bay in Victoria’s South East. As it grew dark, the boat…
Only in New York by Lily Brett
Read this book if: a) you have been or are going to New York, b) you are interested in how a writer thinks, or c) if you are curious about psychics in the Big Apple. You should also read this…
Yes Please by Amy Poehler
If you’ve never heard of Amy Poehler … well, if you’ve never heard of Amy Poehler, Yes Please might not be the book for you. But for those who are familiar with the comedian, writer and actress, Yes Please is…
What Days Are For by Robert Dessaix
What unit of time best measures life? A year? A lifetime? A moment? Rushing to treat his patient for a heart attack, a paramedic asks Robert Dessaix if he’s had a good day. ‘A good day? I give a muffled…
The Dangerous Bride by Lee Kofman
Lee Kofman loves her husband deeply, and he loves her. But in a marriage full of romance but increasingly devoid of sexual passion, the Russian-born Israeli writer – addicted to freedom and pleasure and strangeness – begins to feel this…
A Bone of Fact by David Walsh
David Walsh – Tasmanian, mathematician, gambler and museum owner – still seems like something of a fiction. Despite an extended profile published in The New Yorker, written by Richard Flanagan, and multiple sightings around Hobart, a sense of insubstantiality…
Browse our reviews by category
