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The Bookshelf

ABC listen•www.abc.net.au
Arts
Books
What are you reading, loving or being challenged by? We review the latest in fiction for dedicated readers and for those who wish they read more.
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Episodes

Summer Reads: history remade, futures reimagined

Reclaiming and retelling Australian history, where time is both stilled and circular, in Melissa Lucashenko's Edenglassie; and commenting on the past through alternative futures, in Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah's Chain-Gang All-Stars, Catherine Lacey's Biography of X and Carole Hailey's The Silence Project.

Jan 19, 2024•54 min

Summer Reads: from Aphra Behn to Max Porter

Restoration political satire, Mediaeval rumour, eco-terrorism in New Zealand and a young man with a mixtape full of angst. Reading Max Porter's Shy, Eleanor Catton's Birnam Wood, Robyn Cadwallader's The Fire and the Rose with guests Clare Mabey and Clare Monagle; and an introduction to the writing of Aphra Behn from novelist Karen Brooks (The Escapades of Tribulation Johnson)

Jan 05, 2024•54 min

Summer reading: heists, horses, Harlem, Ireland, rage

Looking for books to rock you back on your heels? You've come to the right place. Kate and Cassie read Deborah Levy's August Blue, Colson Whitehead's Crook Manifesto, Elizabeth McCracken's The Hero of this Book and Claire Kilroy's Soldier Sailor, with Miles Merrill, Bernadette Brennan, Jonathan Green and Ashley Hay

Dec 29, 2023•54 min

Summer Reads: Impossible creatures, an Indian thriller and love in a cherry orchard

Best books from the year, and some new interviews too. Kate and Cassie read Ann Patchett’s Tom Lake and Deepti Kapoor’s Age of Vice with guest crime specialist Sue Turnbull (and an extended conversation with Kapoor), and fantasy and the imagination with scholar and children’s author Katherine Rundell and her Impossible Creatures.

Dec 22, 2023•54 min

Romance, crime, adventure: Summer reading recommendations

Melanie Saward joins Kate for a genre-filled reading recommendation discussion of romance, the pseudonymous crime fiction of Australian author George Johnston (with Derham Groves), and historical fiction of the Hundred Years War with Dan Jones. What will you read over Summer?

Dec 15, 2023•54 min

Best Books of 2023: What to read now, next and over Summer

Kate, Cassie and three reading guests (critic Beejay Silcox, Books Editor Jason Steger and kids' author Tristan Bancks) on the books they've loved, the books they'd recommend, the books to give to a friend, the books to read over Summer (and yes, there is a list).

Dec 08, 2023•54 min

Bad Art Mother: Canberra Writers Festival Book Club pod extra

Kate Evans onstage for the Bookshelf and Canberra Writers Festival with CWF Artistic Director and critic Beejay Silcox, and novelist Edwina Preston, on Edwina's novel Bad Art Mother . . . and art, writing, motherhood, poetry and all the rest.

Dec 07, 2023•58 min

The Book Club: Thrillers

Are you a crime fiction thriller fan? Those stories that get your heart racing and keep you awake all night? Even if you only dip into the genre once in a blue moon, you'll want to join us for a lively thriller themed Book Club with two top-notch crime fiction afficiandoes.

Dec 01, 2023•53 min

New novels from Christos Tsiolkas, Amanda Lohrey, David Diop and Siân Hughes

Kate and Cassie read Christos Tsiolkas' The In-Between, Siân Hughes' Pearl, Amanda Lohrey's The Conversion and David Diop's Beyond the Door of No Return with guests critic and literary judge James Ley and novelist and podcaster Kate Mildenhall. Translation, shame, lamentations, renovation and love.

Oct 27, 2023•1 hr

Jellyfish, beauty, betrayal and Camelot: new fiction

Kate and Cassie read Victoria Gosling's Bliss and Blunder, Sophie Keetch's Morgan is my Name, Joel Deane's Judas Boys and Mona Awad's Rouge with novelist A J Betts and theatre writer Tom Wright

Oct 20, 2023•54 min

The Book Club - Short Stories

In this edition of The Book Club we look at the art, and the science, of the short story with three brand new and intriguing Australian collections.

Sep 29, 2023•54 min

Lauren Groff, Daniel Mason and Anna Kate Blair: fables, trees, history and art

Kate and Cassie read Lauren Groff's The Vaster Wilds, Daniel Mason's North Woods and Anna Kate Blair's The Modern with writer Maggie Mackellar (Graft) and the Art Show's Rosa Ellen. Survival, hunger, lush landscapes, ambition, art, history . . . with a surprising side of beetles, apples, wedding dresses and frozen fish.

Sep 21, 2023•54 min

Novels by Anne Enright, Paul Lynch and Emma Donoghue: love, pain, politics and Ireland

Reading yet more extraordinary fiction from Irish novelists (OK Emma Donoghue actually now lives in Canada, but she's originally Irish): Kate and Cassie on Paul Lynch's Prophet Song, Anne Enright's The Wren, The Wren, and Emma Donoghue's Learned by Heart with guests critic and novelist Gretchen Shirm and poet Beth Spencer

Sep 15, 2023•57 min

The Book Club: Frank Moorhouse Retrospective

A year on from the death of Frank Moorhouse, we examine the work of this much-loved yet troubled writer with his biographer Catharine Lumby and colleague Angelo Loukakis.

Sep 01, 2023•1 hr 5 min