International fiction
French Exit by Patrick deWitt
‘French Exit’: hastily leaving a social gathering without saying goodbye (see also, Irish Goodbye, taking English Leave, ghosting). Frances, her adult son Malcolm and their cat, Small Frank, are out of money. They’re also sick of the social obligations of…
Take Nothing With You by Patrick Gale
In an attempt to rebound from his previous relationship, Eustace meets the calm and confident Theo on a dating app. Twenty years his junior, Theo is stationed on a military base, and their romance is confined to Skype calls. As…
Now We Shall Be Entirely Free by Andrew Miller
English author Andrew Miller has been winning awards for his writing ever since his first book, Ingenious Pain, was published in 1997 and won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and the Grinzane…
Orchid & the Wasp by Caoilinn Hughes
Orchid & the Wasp opens outrageously and does not miss a beat from there: ‘It is our right to be virgins as often as we like, Gael told the girls … Gael was eleven. It was her last term in…
Radiant Shimmering Light by Sarah Selecky
Eleven Novak’s name is her brand; a teacher of enlightenment and spirituality with a powerful online presence. Eleven is beautiful, inspirational and successful and each year takes a group of followers through her famous transforming ‘Ascendancy Program’. Lillian Quick is…
Early Riser by Jasper Fforde
Jasper Fforde – master of absurdity, champion of satire, ridiculer of bureaucracy, and proud Welshman – is back. If that sentence doesn’t fill you with a thrill of excitement then you’ve obviously never encountered Fforde’s particular brand of literary lampoon…
Give Me Your Hand by Megan Abbott
Megan Abbott was a guest of the Melbourne Writers Festival in 2017, and I heard her speak in a session titled, ‘The Dark Side of Womanhood’. Abbott, a literary thriller writer, spoke about her enjoyment of creating female characters who…
The Pisces by Melissa Broder
Melissa Broder is the author of So Sad Today, a powerful collection of essays about feminism, sex, love, depression, and addiction. Broder’s first novel, The Pisces, takes these topics, and explores them within the framework of a confronting…
Clock Dance by Anne Tyler
A few years ago, there was a rumour going around that there wouldn’t be any more stories from Anne Tyler. She was threatening to retire from writing – after fifty-plus years, twenty novels and a Pulitzer Prize, there was going…
Days of Awe by A.M. Homes
A.M. Homes is one of my favourite authors, and I am hungry for any new writing from her. Homes is a brilliant analyst of life in the anxious times of late capitalism, where personal relationships and the nuclear family have…
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