The Readings Podcast

In this episode, The Dominatrix Next Door: when a cash-strapped single mother of two in suburban Melbourne has a fun idea to start a side hustle running workshops for hens' parties, she has no idea it will lead her on a surreal adventure (or twenty) through the underground world of kink clubs and swingers' parties. Nor does she know that it will bring her out on the other end as one of Australia's most recognised Dominatrixes. Mistress Jane has penned a memoir that is both a salacious tell-all and a love letter to Melbourne's BDSM community. Complete with celebrity encounters, exciting opportunities, and lessons in kink, love, and parenthood, she shows us how having multiple identities is not only possible, but incredible, and that some mums really are superheroes – they might just use their rope and masks in a different way than you'd expect.

In this episode of The Comics Question, Bernard Caleo interviews Sarah Firth on the topic of Eventually Everything Connects. Eventually Everything Connects is Firth's debut graphic novel, a collection of interconnected visual essays created over eight years. Firth invites you into her wild mind as she explores ways to see with fresh eyes, to face the inevitability of change, and to find freedom in sensuality.

In this episode, hear an online conversation between Zadie Smith and Esther Anatolitis (editor of Meanjin). Smith’s new book The Fraud is a dazzling novel about truth and fiction, Jamaica and Britain, fraudulence and authenticity, and the mystery of 'other people.’ Set in late 19th century London, Smith uses the real-world Tichborne Trial as a storytelling spine. At the time, this trial captivated England. At its core, it was a trial about identity: Sir Roger Tichborne, long believed dead, arrives back in England to claim his title. The only witness called is Andrew Bogle, a former enslaved man from Jamaica. Reacting to the story is Mrs Eliza Touchet, the housekeeper and cousin of once successful novelist William Ainsworth.

In this episode, a conversation with academics and writers Mark Edele and Marko Pavlyshyn. Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine came as a shock to most of the world. In order to understand why this happened, a growing army of self-declared experts provided explanations often misrepresenting the history of Ukraine and of Russia and misinterpreting the pre-history of this war and the role of outside forces. Mark Edele, a world authority on the history of the Soviet Union, explains why and how this conflict came about in his new book, Russia's War Against Ukraine. He considers competing historical claims and arguments with authority and lucidity. The book informs a more nuanced and well-informed debate about this war and its implications. Please note, this is a recording from a live in-store event.

In this episode, a conversation with author, speechwriter and poet Joel Deane, on his eagerly-awaited new novel, Judas Boys. Deane’s protagonist (of sorts) Pinnock is, as the title suggests, a Judas Boy – a private schoolboy gone to seed. He's lost his job as a political staffer. He sleeps in the garage of his estranged wife. He has finally run out of friends and must face his accusers – both the living and the dead. This book is a searing de profundis that reads like the secret history behind today's political headlines. Deane brings the aftermath of professional catastrophe, personal betrayal, and public disgrace to life with a poet's ear for the human voice fractured in extremis.

In today’s episode, a conversation with David McAllister, author of Ballet Confidential. Ballet Confidential takes us backstage, in a manner of speaking, and serves as a wonderfully elucidatory introduction to the world of ballet. McAllister’s enthusiasm paired with experience, mastery even, means that Ballet Confidential has something for everyone, from longtime fans of ballet to those who it might have never occurred to step a foot inside the theatre. Mcallister is the former artistic director and principal dancer of The Australian Ballet, which he joined in 1983. Among many major works, he performed principal roles with the company in The Sleeping Beauty, Romeo and Juliet, Don Quixote, Coppelia, Onegin, and Manon.

Please note, this episode contains discussion of child sexual abuse. In this episode, hear David Meagher, author of Secrets and Lies, in conversation. Secrets and Lies is a story about child sexual abuse; the culture that enabled it; how the perpetrator groomed his victims; how the abuse came to an end; and how, four decades after the crimes were committed, his victims embarked on a successful two-year journey to bring the offender to justice. To interview David about this book, and this story, we’re joined by Stephen Brook, deputy editor of The Sunday Age.

In this episode, a conversation with poet and author Siân Hughes, whose book Pearl is longlisted for this year’s Booker Prize. Pearl is a stunning novel, originally published in the United Kingdom by The Indigo Press, and has just been republished in Australia by University of Queensland Press. Pearl is a ghost story, a folk story, a story of loss and familial haunting. Hughes’ narrator, Marianne, is eight years old when her mother goes missing. Left behind with her baby brother and grieving father in a ramshackle house on the edge of a small village, she clings to the fragmented memories of her mother’s love, and the songs and stories of her childhood. Discovering a medieval poem called Pearl and trusting in its promise of consolation, Marianne sets out to make a visual illustration of it, a task that returns to over and over but somehow never manages to complete.

In this episode, a conversation with journalists, Tracey Kirkland and Gavin Fang, editors of the essay collection, Pandemedia: How Covid Changed Journalism. The Covid-19 pandemic ripped through the world with no regard for borders, age, status or wealth. It was brutal in its impact and created a raft of new social norms. And without warning, the pandemic changed journalism, in some ways irrevocably. With contributors including Stan Grant, Michelle Grattan, David Speers, Alan Kohler, Lisa Millar and Dr Norman Swan, Pandemedia takes readers behind the scenes of Australia's media organisations to give a firsthand perspective on the new reign of the fourth estate.

In this episode, a recording taken from the launch for Eugen Bacon’s most recent novel, Serengotti. This is a novel bathed in sensuous, original language, a love letter to the strong women who bind families together despite everything. It’s also a tender remembrance of the many who haven’t or couldn’t survive the dislocations and tragedies of their turbulent pasts. For the launch, Bacon was in conversation with award-winning author and translator Dominique Hecq.

In this episode, author Kate Grenville talks about her latest book, Restless Dolly Maunder. This novel brings Kate’s grandmother to life as someone we can recognise and whose struggles we can empathise with. This compelling new novel is the story of a woman, working her way through a world of limits and obstacles, who was able — if at a cost —to make a life she could call her own. Her battles and triumphs helped to open doors for the women who came after. Grenville was interviewed by Yves Rees, writer, historian and podcaster who co-hosts Archive Fever.

In this episode, The Victorian Pride Centre on Fitzroy Street, St Kilda, in Melbourne’s south, was opened on 11 July 2021. Its location, its design and its well-thought out objectives combine to make it one of the most imaginative and sympathetic public places in Australia. Dr Judith Buckrich’s book, The Making Of The Victorian Pride Centre, details not only the building of this now-iconic centre and its gorgeous architecture, but also provides an overview of the history of LGBTIQ+ people in Australia, particularly in Melbourne, in a beautifully photographed and edited volume. To go into the history of the Pride Centre, we were joined by Jude Munro, inaugural chair of the Victorian Pride Centre, and, Nicholas Henderson, sound curator at the National Film and Sound Archive and curator at the Australian Queer Archive. To interview our guests, we enlisted the help of James McKenzie, longtime broadcaster on 3CR Community Radio with the show In Ya Face.

In this episode, an interview with Polly Barton, writer and translator. Barton is the author of two books of nonfiction, Fifty Sounds from 2021, and Porn: An Oral History, published this year. Barton has also translated numerous works of fiction from Japanese into English, including Mieko Kanai’s Mild Vertigo and Kikuko Tsumura’s There’s No Such Thing As An Easy Job – with more to come.

This episode is the fourth instalment of The Comics Question series. In these podcasts, Bernard Caleo and Nico Callaghan discuss comics, graphic novels, and the place they inhabit within the broader books and publishing world. For this episode, Bernard and Nico sat down with Michael Fikaris, a central figure in both the comic book and street art movements of the early 2000s in his hometown of Melbourne. Fikaris has exhibited in professional and guerrilla contexts locally and abroad. His artwork is held in numerous private collections along with the National Gallery of Victoria, State Library of Victoria, and National Gallery of Australia.

In today’s episode, from one of Australia’s most wryly funny writers comes an original and utterly hilarious memoir of reaching for the stars while lying in a ditch. Robert Skinner arrives in Melbourne, searching for a richer life. Things begin badly and then, surprisingly, get slightly worse. Pretty soon he’s sleeping rough and trying to run a literary magazine out of a dog park. His quest for meaning keeps being thwarted, by endless jobs, beagles, house parties, ill-advised love affairs, camel trips and bureaucratic entanglements. Sometimes a book catches the spirit of the times, and Skinner’s book I’d Rather Not is about work, escape and that something more we all need.

In this episode, a discussion with author Angela O’Keeffe about her new novel, The Sitter. Paris, 2020. A writer is confined to her hotel room during the early days of the pandemic, struggling to finish a novel about Hortense Cezanne, wife and sometime muse of the famous painter. Dead for more than a century, Hortense has been reawakened by this creative endeavour, and now shadows the writer through the locked-down city. But Hortense, always subject to the gaze of others, is increasingly intrigued by the woman before her. Who is she and what event hides in her past? Heartbreaking and perfectly formed, The Sitter explores the tension between artist and subject, and between the stories told about us and the stories we choose to tell.

In this episode, hear Om Dhungel and James Button in conversation with Elly Varrenti, to celebrate the publication of Om’s memoir, Bhutan to Blacktown. This book tells Om Dhungel’s remarkable story — his journey from a remote village to a senior position in the Bhutanese Civil Service, to life as a human rights activist in Nepal and, eventually, to his work as a community leader in Blacktown, western Sydney. Every step prepared Om for the central role he would play in settling more than 5000 Bhutanese refugees, in one of the most successful refugee initiatives in Australia’s history. Written with Walkley Award-winning journalist James Button, Bhutan to Blacktown is a story of grit and struggle, humour and irrepressible optimism — and how losing nearly everything shaped one man’s character and fate.

In this episode, a recording taken from bestselling journalist Antony Loewenstein discussing his latest book, The Palestine Laboratory. This book demonstrates in depth how Israel has become a leader in developing spying technology and defence hardware that fuels some of the globe’s most brutal conflicts. Loewenstein was interviewed at our Carlton store by Jeff Sparrow, a writer, journalist and broadcaster.

In this episode, Bruce Wolpe in conversation with Sean Kelly to discuss Wolpe's new book, Trump's Australia. In the book, leading expert and US and Australian politics insider Wolpe reveals the many ways in which Australia was damaged by Donald Trump's presidency, and ponders what could happen if Trump (or a Trump-like candidate) becomes US president in 2024.

In this episode, a conversation with Andrew Skeoch, author of the recently released book, Deep Listening to Nature. As one of Australia's best-known nature sound recordists, Skeoch’s work offers us an invitation and an opportunity to open our ears to nature, and to learn from the world around us. Particularly focused on avian life, his book is an inspiring text filled with reflection, wonder and rumination.

In this episode, a conversation with author Tegan Bennet Daylight, centred around her new YA novel, Royals. A group of teenagers alone in an empty shopping centre, with everything they could possibly want ... and a baby? With no phones, no internet and no way out, Shannon and five other trapped teens are completely disconnected from the outside world ... and their online lives. It’s hard to say whether they’ll be driven to delinquency, or – even worse – forced to make friends irl. This conversation took place as part of the Readings Teen Advisory Board program.

In today’s episode, booksellers Justin Amalimal Cantrell and Nico Callaghan are joined by Aurelia Guo, a writer and researcher based in London, for a conversation centred on her book, World of Interiors. Of the book, Guo writes: “In World of Interiors I use collage and appropriation to destabilise the first-person ‘I’. I also write directly about the inescapable condition of being perceived and positioned by other people. Our lives take place in time and space, meaning in history and geography, as well as in relation to one another – not just interpersonally, but intergenerationally, with all the baggage of race, class, gender and nation that this implies. I write about economic cycles of wealth and poverty at the levels of the individual, group and state. The book is about travel and immigration: migrants, tourists and refugees. It is about the work of survival and the cost of survival. It is also a hopeful book – about how strong and indomitable the will can be.”

In this episode, an interview with Ros Ben-Moshe, author of The Laughter Effect, a powerful philosophy that enhances wellbeing and provides you with a road map to tap into the lighter side of life and awaken both your inner and outer smile. Drawing on research, practice and wisdom from humour and laughter therapy, along with positive psychology and neuroscience, health promotion academic and laughter wellness expert Ros Ben-Moshe offers a new dimension to self-care, elevating mindfulness, gratitude and self-compassion. This book is enriched by case studies from around the globe, and Ros shares how the highly accessible Laughter Effect enhances resilience to stress, enabling you to respond to adversity and bounce forward with humour, levity and grace. Living the Laughter Effect will awaken a positive change in yourself, how you respond to the world and, in turn, how the world responds to you.

In this episode, Mary Crooks, executive director of the Victorian Women’s Trust, chairs a conversation with the authors of The Voice To Parliament Handbook, Thomas Mayo and Kerry O’Brien. The Voice to Parliament Handbook is an easy-to-follow guide for the millions of Australians who have expressed support for the Uluru Statement from the Heart, but want to better understand what a Voice to Parliament actually means.

In this episode, a conversation with Sarah Street, author of the new book, A Curse of Salt. Drawing comparisons to Brigid Kemmerer’s Cursebreakers series and Sarah J Maas's A Court of Thorns and Roses, Street’s debut novel is a reworking of the time-old tale of Beauty and The Beast set amidst the high seas.

In this episode, a recording taken from an event at Readings Carlton, to celebrate the publication of Benjamin Hegarty’s book, The Made Up State: technology, trans femininity and Citizenship in Indonesia. In The Made Up State, anthropologist Benjamin Hegarty contends that warias, who compose one of Indonesia's trans feminine populations, have cultivated a distinctive way of captivating the affective, material, and spatial experiences of belonging to a modern public sphere. Hegarty was joined in discussion by Dennis Altman, Vice Chancellor's Fellow at LaTrobe University and University of Melbourne Cultural Studies Researcher Annisa Beta.

In this episode, a conversation with Mikki Brammer. Her new novel, The Collected Regrets of Clover, is a big-hearted and life-affirming novel that turns the normally taboo subject of death into a reason to celebrate life. It's a sparkling debut which reminds us all to live life with fewer regrets. Brammer was interviewed by Readings Marketing Manager, Rosalind McClintock.

This episode features a live event recording taken of a conversation between Alexis Wright and Ivor Indyk, to celebrate the publication of Wright’s new novel, Praiseworthy. Alexis Wright is a remarkable writer, originally hailing from the from the Waanyi nation in the Gulf of Carpentaria. Her novel Carpentaria won the 2007 Miles Franklin award, and Wright was awarded the 2018 Stella Prize for her biography of “Tracker" Tilmouth. Praiseworthy is Wright’s fourth novel.

In this episode, a conversation with Kate J. Armstrong, author of the new YA novel, Nightbirds. Set in a dazzling new fantasy world full of whispered secrets and political intrigue, the magic of women is outlawed but three girls with unusual gifts have the chance to change it all. Filled with sumptuous, cinematic writing and dazzling details, Nightbirds is a fiercely feminist fantasy debut where the most potent magic lies not in a kiss, but in the truth. Armstrong is in conversation with the Readings Marketing Assistant, Lucie Dess.

In this episode, listen to a conversation between English author Max Porter and Readings Podcast Editor, Nico Callaghan. This recording is taken from an online event celebrating the release of Porter’s most recent novel, Shy.

This episode features the recording of an online conversation focused on the newest edition of The Quarterly Essay, The Wires That Bind: Electrification and Community Renewal, penned by Saul Griffith. In this edition, inventor, engineer and visionary Saul Griffith reveals the world that awaits us if we make the most of Australia’s energy future. Griffith was interviewed by Simon Holmes A Court, an Australian business and political activist, and the convenor of Climate 200.

This recording is the third instalment of The Comics Question series. In these podcasts, Bernard Caleo and Nico Callaghan discuss comics, graphic novels, and the place they inhabit within the broader books and publishing world. In this episode, Bernard and Nico sit down with Steven Christie, writer and artist to discuss, among other things, his publications Arrowheads and Turtlenecks.

In this episode, a recording taken from the launch of Gregory Day’s novel, The Bell of The World. The Bell of the World is both a song to the natural wonders that are not yet gone and a luminous prehistory of contemporary climate change and its connection to colonialism. Bell is in conversation with writer and broadcaster Elly Varrenti.

In this episode, a conversation with Hugh Mackay, social psychologist and bestselling author. Mackay’s latest book, The Therapist, is a powerful and poignant story of deception, ambiguity, lust and love – and the challenge of living with the consequences of our actions.

In this episode, enjoy a discussion with author Katherine Kovacic about her latest work, Seven Sisters. Seven Sisters is a twisty, intriguing crime novel for fans of The Mother and The Family Doctor.

A recording of the launch for Kate Auty’s book, O’Leary Of The Underworld: The Untold Story of the Forest River Massacre. This book is a powerful investigation that reveals the deep injustices inflicted on Aboriginal people in the Kimberley in the 1920s. Please note, this episode contains discussion topics and readings from Auty’s work that some listeners may find distressing.