The Bookshelf
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.
Episodes
Laura McPhee Browne, Leïla Slimani, Kris Kneen & Bruce Pascoe's favourite Aus books
This week on The Bookshelf, Kate Evans and Cassie McCullagh discuss new novels including Laura McPhee-Browne's Worry Doll, a story of desire, obsession and uncertainty; Leïla Slimani's I'll Take the Fire, the acclaimed French-Moroccan writer's rich, politically charged exploration of family, memory and identity; and Kris Kneen's Rite of Spring, an eerie island novel where strange
Melbourne Writers' Festival with Hannah Kent and Beejay Silcox
A live recording from the 2025 Melbourne Writers Festival, with guests Hannah Kent and Beejay Silcox.Hannah Kent, Always Home, Always Homesick (Picador)Eimear McBride, The City Changes Its Face (Faber)Susan Choi, Flashlight (Jonathan Cape)Edward St Aubyn, Parallel Lines (Jonathan Cape)Caryl Phillips, Another Man in the Street (Bloomsbury)GuestsHannah Kent is the author of the nov
The Bookshelf’s best: Four standout novels from the past year
We review the latest in fiction for dedicated readers and for those who wish they read more.
Zan Rowe and Madeleine Gray review: Chris Ames/Fiona Mozley/Niamh Campbell
Cassie McCullagh is joined by Jonathan Green this time, for a wide-ranging hour of new fiction, from Australia and beyond. First, Fiona Mozley’s unsettling Awake Awake, where a young woman begins to suspect her grandfather may have killed Adolf Hitler, Zan Rowe weighs in. Then, Irish writer Niamh Campbell’s Make Strange, a quietly eerie novel about a four-year-old asking impossib
Michael Robotham and Roanna Gonsalves review: Andrew Sean Greer/Ilka Tampke/Michael Pedersen
From a sun-drenched Tuscan reset with a side of style advice (Andrew Sean Greer's Villa Coco via Michael Robotham), to Ilka Tampke’s How To Love the World, a tender take on parenting and the pull of the bush (guided by Roanna Gonsalves), and throw in a windswept lighthouse on the edge of the world with Michael Pedersen’s Muckle Flugga.~ OTHER BOOKS MENTIONEDCharles Bukowski, work
Hannah Kent and Tom Wright review: Maggie O'Farrell/Ann Patchett/Christine Balint
Kate Evans and Cassie McCullagh are joined by regulars Hannah Kent and Tom Wright to talk new fiction from three major voices: Maggie O’Farrell’s Land, an expansive novel set in famine-era Ireland that traces memory, myth and the imprint of history on place; Ann Patchett’s Whistler, a sharp story of family, lost fathers and the long shadow of childhood; and Christine Balint’s A S
Beejay Silcox & Bernadette Brennan review: Doireann Ní Ghríofa/Chloe Wilson/Deborah Levy
Kate Evans is joined by Bernadette Brennan and Beejay Silcox to talk three striking new releases: Doireann Ní Ghríofa’s Said the Dead, a haunting, archive-rich exploration of a derelict Irish asylum; Chloe Wilson’s The Thornbacks, a darkly comic debut of morticians, dating apps and unsettling female entanglements; and Deborah Levy’s My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein, a playful
Launching ABC Radio National’s 2026 Top 100 Books countdown at SWF
The Bookshelf comes to you from a sold out session at Sydney Writers’ Festival, for a conversation that brings together an exceptional line-up: acclaimed novelist and poet Tony Birch, Miles Franklin Award-winning author Siang Lu, and internationally celebrated writer Lily King. Together, with Cassie, Kate and special guest Claire Nichols from The Book Show, they mark the launch o
Madeleine Gray & Tim Rogers review: Wayne Marshall/Ellena Savage/Lena Dunham/Douglas Stuart
We head by rackety ferry to Scotland in John of John, the latest, quietly devastating novel from Shuggie Bain author Douglas Stuart. Henry Lawson reimagined - brawling poets, strange tunnels, time loops, and a warped tussle between city and bush in Wayne Marshall’s Henry Goes Bush, reviewed by You Am I's Tim Rogers. From there, novelist Madeleine Gray turns her eye to Lena Dunham
Robert Forster & Geordie Williamson review: Elizabeth Strout/Daniel Kehlmann/Portia Elan
This week’s Bookshelf features the latest from Elizabeth Strout, creator of Olive Kitteridge and Lucy Barton, returning with a stand‑alone novel called The Things We Never Say. We’re also reading an ambitious, genre‑bending novel that moves from 1980s gaming culture to far‑future space travel, and Daniel Kehlmann’s The Director, a German novel in translation that explores film, p
Hannah Kent & Tom Wright review: Amanda Lohrey/Deepa Anappara + International Booker
In this episode, superstar reviewer Hannah Kent tackles the rugged terrain of a journey that edges towards the Tibetan border in Deepa Anappara's The Last of Earth, and theatre writer Tom Wright ponders extraterrestrial encounters in Amanda Lohrey's new one, Capture. Plus, Kate and Cassie take a look at two titles on the International Booker Prize shortlist, from France and Bulga
Tony Birch & Beejay Silcox review: Inga Simpson/Asako Yuzuki/Helen Bain
This week The Bookshelf leans into the wild as Kate Evans and guests are circled by stories of wolves, wild boar and witches, along with the final year of celebrated poet Sylvia Plath and a sensual story of food and obsession from Japan. Kate is joined by regular guests, the novelist, poet and Professor of Australian literature Tony Birch; and critic Beejay Silcox, who arrives fr
Tim Rogers & Madeleine Gray review: Amitav Ghosh/Edwina Preston/Gwendoline Riley
In this episode, Kate and Cassie are joined by celebrated novelist Madeleine Gray and rock icon Tim Rogers for a wide-ranging discussion looking at three works of contemporary fiction: Indian writer Amitav Ghosh’s Ghost Eye, a meditation on reincarnation and climate change; Australian writer and musician Edwina Preston’s Sororicidal, a sharp novel of sisterhood and rivalry; and E
Michael Robotham & Geordie Williamson review: Steve Toltz/Ben Lerner/Siân Hughes
Memory, lost conversations and almost-fathers-and sons in Ben Lerner's Transcription; children divided by the throw of a dice, and that's just the start of it, in Steve Toltz's A Rising of the Lights; no such thing as unskilled labour, in Siân Hughes' No Such Thing as Monday, where a woman works as a drycleaner, trying desperately to rid herself of the stains of her childhood; ne
~ Festival Special: Irish Writer Colum McCann
What does it mean to write using an 'ethical imagination'? Colum McCann onstage with Kate Evans at the 2025 Melbourne Writers Festival, on his novels Twist, Apeirogon, TransAtlantic, Let the Great World Spin and many more; and his work with the social justice storytelling movement, Narrative Four.Presenter/ Producer: Kate EvansSound Engineers: Simon Branthwaite, Antonia GauciActi
Yann Martel, Debra Adelaide and Fiona Kelly McGregor - from myth to mid‑century Sydney
This week The Bookshelf revisits the Trojan War from the ground up in Yann Martel’s Son of Nobody, moves through friendship and loss in Debra Adelaide’s When I Am Sixty‑Four, and dives into queer Sydney in the 1940s with Fiona Kelly McGregor’s The Trap. BOOKSFiona Kelly McGregor, The Trap, PicadorDebra Adelaide, When I Am Sixty-Four, UQPYann Martel, Son of Nobody, TextGUESTSTom W
Short fiction from Louise Erdrich; essays by Alex Miller; and a surreal comic tale from Michael Winkler
A rich mix of voices and stories in short fiction from acclaimed Native American writer Louise Erdrich; essays and memories from two‑time Miles Franklin Award winner Alex Miller; bleakly funny childhood tales by English author Mark Haddon; and, from Michael Winkler, a surreal and darkly comic story about a man who decides he’d rather be the family dog.BOOKS Michael Winkler, Grief
Lanchester, Groff and Costello — reviewed by Hannah Kent and Tim Rogers
What if the most talked‑about streaming show of the moment was a mirror reflecting your most private fears and failures? That unnerving question sits at the heart of John Lanchester’s Look What You Made Me Do, a sharp novel about resentment, revenge, money, class and generational unease. Plus: the art of the short story, as Hannah Kent reads and reflects on Lauren Groff’s new col
~ Festival Special: Bringing the past to life with Emily Maguire and Jock Serong
A Bookshelf festival special featuring Kate Evans onstage with writers Jock Serong and Emily Maguire on historical fiction, from the 2025 Sydney Writers Festival.GUESTSEmily Maguire is a novelist and essayist whose books include An Isolated Incident and Love Objects, and her latest, RaptureJock Serong is a novelist and lawyer, whose books include The Rules of Backyard Cricket, On
Siblings, secrets and shame in regional Australia in M L Stedman's A Far Flung Life and Eva Hornung's The Minstrels (REVIEWERS Michael Robotham and Roanna Gonsalves)
Statues come alive and London is re-imagined in Francis Spufford's Nonesuch, and surprising parallels in two Australian novels of secrets, shame, land and time in M L Stedman's A Far-Flung Life and Eva Hornung's The Minstrels. Kate Evans, Cassie McCullagh, Michael Robotham and Roanna Gonsalves - to help you decide what to read next.BOOKSFrancis Spufford, Nonesuch, FaberEva Hornun
Gabriel Tallent: Crux + Claire Thomas: On Not Climbing Mountains + Helle Helle: They (REVIEWERS: Hannah Kent and Tom Wright)
In this episode, we travel from the Swiss Alps to the quiet strangeness of Danish suburbia and the fierce edges of American literary drama. We begin with the visceral intensity of Gabriel Tallent’s latest novel, Crux, where characters cling to passion and survival with bloodied fingertips. Claire Thomas reflects on art, ambition, and the lure of towering peaks in On Not Climbing
Does Emerald Fennell's Wuthering Heights adaptation do justice to the original novel?
Emerald Fennell's film adaptation of Wuthering Heights has been marketed as "the greatest love story ever told", which is not typically the description given to the original novel. What does this adaptation achieve, and what does it sacrifice in the process?The Bookshelf's Kate Evans and Radio National's Arts Hour's Sky Kirkham discuss what they felt did and didn't work in this f
Tayari Jones: Kin + Nadia Davids: Cape Fever + two bloody rom-coms (REVIEWERS: Tony Birch and Beejay Silcox)
Kate and Cassie read Kin, the latest novel from Tayari Jones — the acclaimed American novelist behind An American Marriage, a book that resonated with both critics and readers alike. Her work sits alongside a bold mix of stories in this episode, from a vampiric love story to speed‑dating slasher fiction, and South African writer Nadia Davids adds her own unsettling brilliance, ta
So Far Gone: Jess Walter + Good People: Patmeena Sabit + Eradication: Jonathan Miles (REVIEWERS: Tim Rogers and Madeleine Gray)
Join Kate and Cassie as they explore new fiction alongside guests: musician Tim Rogers (You Am I) and novelist Madeleine Gray (Green Dot, Chosen Family). Three American novels, each tackling big ideas in very different ways - from the political absurdity and humour of Jess Walter’s So Far Gone, to the mockumentary-style tensions of Patmeena Sabit’s Good People, to the darkly comi
Madeline Cash: Lost Lambs + George Saunders: Vigil + new releases by George Kemp and Steven Carroll (REVIEWERS: Michael Robotham & Roanna Gonsalves)
Madeline Cash’s buzzy debut Lost Lambs pairs an off‑kilter storytelling sensibility with a sharp exploration of displacement and identity. George Saunders returns with Vigil, offering his moral curiosity in a novel that probes what it means to pay attention to the world. George Kemp’s Soft Serve delivers a charming and quietly affecting debut about growing up in a small town; and
Michael Mohammed Ahmad: Bugger + Jeanette McCurdy: Half His Age + Nina McConigley: How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder (REVIEWERS: Hannah Kent & Tom Wright)
Kate and Cassie read award-winning Australian author Michael Mohammed Ahmad’s bold new novel Bugger, while reviewers Hannah Kent and Tom Wright take on Jennette McCurdy’s provocative new book Half His Age — from the former child actor whose memoir I'm Glad My Mom Died shook readers worldwide — and Nina McConigley’s How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder...does it live up to the name
Julian Barnes: Departure(s) + Cassie Stroud: Iluka + Patrick Charnley: This, My Second Life (REVIEWERS: Tony Birch & Beejay Silcox)
Kate and Cassie are back for a big year of books, beginning with Booker-Prize winner Julian Barnes' Departures, a novel about looking back, facing the future, and coming to the end of life. Plus, regular reviewers Tony Birch and Beejay Silcox join us for discussions on This, My Second Life by British novelist Patrick Charnley, and Iluka, by Australian author Cassie Stroud.BOOKSJu
Festival Special: Maggie O'Farrell on Hamnet and more
Novelist and memoirist Maggie O'Farrell in conversation with Kate Evans at the 2025 Sydney Writers Festival. Her nine novels include After You'd Gone, the Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, This Must be the Place, Hamnet and the Marriage Portrait . . . and her extraordinary memoir is I Am I Am I Am: Seventeen Brushes with Death.
Summer Reading: at the Brisbane Writers Festival
Kate and Cassie on stage at the 2025 Brisbane Writers Festival with authors Eric Puchner, Toni Jordan, Patrick Holland, and Zeynab Gamieldien, discussing their most recent novels and the books and writers who inspire them. This discussion was recorded in front of a live audience, just ahead of our Top 100 Books of the Century.It was first broadcast on Friday 17 October 2025GUESTS
Summer Reading: with Alan Hollinghurst, Mariana Enriquez, Afra Atiq and Catherine Chidgey
The Bookshelf's Kate Evans and the Book Show's Claire Nichols joined forces onstage at the 2025 Sydney Writers Festival — with a panel of international writers — to talk favourite and influential books from the 21st century, in the lead up to the inaugural Top 100 Books countdown of the twenty-first century. This live broadcast happened in May 2025 — with Emirati poet Afra Atiq,
Summer Reading: It's time for poetry
Why aren't you reading more poetry? Perhaps you don't know where to begin — in which case, listen here, for a guide.Join Kate Evans, as she is joined by acclaimed author and poet Maxine Beneba Clarke, Stella Prize-winning poet and academic Sarah Holland-Batt, much-loved broadcaster and author Daniel Browning, and best-selling author and journalist Julia Baird to discuss and read
Summer Books Special: Novelist, essayist, raconteur Colm Tóibín
Colm Tóibín onstage at the 2025 Sydney Writers Festival with The Bookshelf's Kate Evans — on fiction, fridges, rain, hinges, melodrama, reading, and why he can't write American dialogue so every character he writes has to be Irish (except, of course, when they're Thomas Mann and family). This is a conversation that begins in his hometown of Enniscorthy, site of his novels Nora We
Summer Reading: Jane Austen's Enduring Charm
In the year of Jane Austen’s 250th birthday, this lively and thought-provoking discussion explores her life, legacy, and literary brilliance — her novels are charming, sure, but also radical, political, witty, and entertaining.Presented in partnership with the State Library of NSW, this event brings together Kate Evans and Cassie McCullagh from The Bookshelf, with Scott Stephens
Summer Books Special: Irish writer Niall Williams' Time of the Child
It's Christmas, 1962, and a baby is born . . . and left behind, in Ireland. This all takes place in the fictional town of Faha, a place created by write Niall Williams in his novels History of the Rain, This is Happiness and (his latest, and the one featuring said baby) Time of the Child.Niall Williams spoke to The Bookshelf's Kate Evans onstage at the 2025 Adelaide Writers Week.
Summer Reading: Bloody Histories
Whodunnit, whydunit, and where in time was all of it done — in an historical crime fiction special for our Summer Bookshelf. Kate Evans, onstage at the 2025 BAD Sydney Crime Festival, with novelists Nilima Rao (the story of an Indian police officer in Fiji in the 1910s), Michael Burge (religious communities and Jenolan caves in the 1850s), and Lainie Anderson (women policing Adel
Some of My Favourite Books: Trent Dalton, Garry Disher and Heather Rose at Canberra Writers Festival
Trent Dalton (Gravity Let Me Go, Boy Swallows Universe), Heather Rose (A Great Act of Love, Bruny) and Garry Disher (the Peninsula Crimes and Hirsch series) name some of their favourite books, and the titles may delight and surprise you. Hosted by Kate and Cassie as part of this year's Canberra Writers' Festival.TRENT DALTON'S PICKSGeraldine Brooks, Year of WondersSteve Toltz, A
The Best Books of 2025
The best books of 2025 as selected by Cassie McCullagh, Kate Evans and a panel of bookish guests - Jason Steger, Jon Page and Robert Goodman. Keep scrolling for a full list...GUESTS Jason Steger, arts journalist. Former book editor of the Age & SMH, and panellist on ABC TV’s Book Club Jon Page, long time bookseller with Pages and Pages bookshop, former General Manager of Dymo
Memoirs, Music, Mystery: new works from Sam Sussman, Sarah Hall, Margaret Atwood
Superstars of the literary and musical world this week: Margaret Atwood’s new memoir; Hannah Kent’s critical readings; Stuart Coupe’s musical knowledge; Bob Dylan . . . OK, well he’s not exactly on the show, but he’s the subject of MUCH literary speculation in a buzzy new release by New Yorker Sam Sussman. Also – the voice of the wind howls, laughs and taunts its subjects, in an
Salman Rushdie's latest/Scandi noir/Australian crime fiction wrap & more...
Short story collections reveal the fragile beauty of human experience in Salman Rushdie’s The Eleventh Hour, Liadan Ní Chuinn’s Everyone Still Here, Morgan Talty’s Night of the Living Rez, and Tony Birch’s Pictures of You. Then we shift gears and crank up the suspense with a look at some new crime fiction, including the icy new instalment in the phenomenally successful The Girl w
Fiction bending reality in new books by Thomas Pynchon, Olivia Laing and Jeanette Winterson
This week, Cassie McCullagh and Jonathan Green take a look at Thomas Pynchon’s Shadow Ticket - a cryptic plunge into paranoia and power, where nothing is quite what it seems. Plus, Olivia Laing’s The Silver Book, a shimmering meditation on the cinema scene in 1970s Italy, and Jeanette Winterson’s One Aladdin Two Lamps, which re-imagines duality and the stories we tell ourselves.B
Madeleine Gray's Chosen Family + Chris Kraus and Graeme Macrae Burnet
Stories of love, friendship, and the ties that bind - with a dash of dirt and darkness in three new works of fiction...Madeleine Gray's Chosen Family, a sharp exploration of friendship, love, and what it means to grow up when life gets messy; Chris Kraus' The Four Spent The Day Together, an autofiction-ish journey through a fractured America; and Graeme Macrae Burnet's Benbecula,
October Book Buzz: Andrew Pippos, Kiran Desai, Olga Ravn & More
Kate and Cassie are back in the studio, introducing a line-up of October releases that span continents, centuries, and genres, kicking off with an Australian story set in the world of print journalism in Andrew Pippos' The Transformations. Then, we head to India with Kiran Desai’s The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny, a grand tale shortlisted for this year’s Booker Prize. And finall
We reveal the books that didn’t quite make the Top 100
Join us for a lively Top 100 Books of the 21st Century after-party!Following last weekend’s extraordinary two-day countdown, this event recaps the results of over 288,000 votes cast by readers across Australia. Kate, Cassie, and special guests will unpack the trends, surprises, and insights that reveal what Australians are reading — and why. Plus, the countdown is not over. We're
Brisbane Writers Festival: Eric Puchner, Toni Jordan, Patrick Holland, Zeynab Gamieldien
Joining Kate and Cassie on stage at Brisbane Writers Festival, authors Eric Puchner, Toni Jordan, Patrick Holland, and Zeynab Gamieldien discuss their most recent novels and the books and writers who inspire them. With voting cast for our Top 100 Books of the Century, these writers make the case for their favourites.GUESTSEric Puchner, novelist, academic, and short story writer,
Four new memoirs: Mandy Sayer/Elizabeth Gilbert/Arundhati Roy/S. Shakthidharan
We look at some compelling new memoirs, including Mandy Sayer’s No Dancing in the Lift, a tribute to her jazz drummer father, capturing the grit of Kings Cross and the grace of caregiving. Elizabeth Gilbert’s All the Way to the River recounts her intense love story with Rayya Elias, confronting addiction and devotion. Arundhati Roy’s Mother Mary Comes to Me reflects on her formid
Top Poems of the 21st Century
What are your favourite poems of the last 25 years? The ones that you turn to, couplets memorised and shared, the lines that leapt from the page or stage. Poetry that both defined and defied space and time, whether it rhymed or not.Join Kate Evans, as she is joined by acclaimed author and poet Maxine Beneba Clarke, Stella Prize-winning poet and academic Sarah Holland-Batt, much-l
Patricia Lockwood's auto-fiction-ish Will There Ever Be Another You + The Buffalo Hunter Hunter + The Original
This week’s episode explores three new books. First up, Patricia Lockwood’s Will There Ever Be Another You, a third-person autofiction-ish tale that includes a family trip to Scotland, grief and fairies. Then we head to the American frontier for blood-soaked vengeance and vampires in Stephen Graham Jones’ The Buffalo Hunter Hunter. Finally, Nell Stevens’ The Original takes us int
Ian McEwan's What We Can Know + new work from Olga Tokarczuk and Miranda Darling
We get stuck into some new fiction, starting with Ian McEwan’s What We Can Know, a meditation on a future shaped by climate disaster and memory. We’re joined by Australian authors Madeleine Gray and Gretchen Shirm to take a look at Miranda Darling’s Fireweather, a poetic story of breakdown and resistance, and Nobel Prize winner Olga Tokarczuk’s House of Day, House of Night, a dr
Still Turning Heads at 250: Jane Austen’s Enduring Charm
In the year of Jane Austen’s 250th birthday, this lively and thought-provoking discussion explores her life, legacy, and literary brilliance — her novels are charming, sure, but also radical, political, witty, and entertaining.Presented in partnership with the State Library of NSW, this event brings together Kate Evans and Cassie McCullagh with Scott Stephens from Radio National'
Superstar children's author Andy Griffiths reviews! Plus, Omar Musa's Fierceland and Geoff Dyer's Homework
Australian poet, artist, hip hop musician and author, Omar Musa, tells a story of Australia and Borneo, forests and fathers, in his new novel Fierceland. An American saga of love, war, and complicated families in Patrick Ryan’s Buckeye, and experimental British author Geoff Dyer returns with Homework, a look back on his childhood and coming of age in sixties and seventies Englan
Greyhounds, dark academia and an Amish community in new fiction by Toni Jordan, R.F. Kuang and Ron Rindo
An Australian story of the tender, eager lives of greyhounds and their owners in Tenderfoot by Australian author Toni Jordan. Dark academia in Yellowface author R.F. Kuang’s new fantasy novel, Katabasis. Sport, miracles, and the Amish, in Ron Rindo’s Life, and Death, and Giants.BOOKS Toni Jordan, Tenderfoot, Hachette R.F. Kuang, Katabasis, Harper Voyager Ron Rindo, Life, and Deat
A simmering summer in Greece, rare snails, dystopia with a twist: new fiction by Amy Taylor, Leif Enger and Maria Reva
The Bookshelf continues to explore new fiction, beginning in this episode with Ruins by Amy Taylor, a plunge into holiday chaos during a simmering summer in Greece. Maria Reva’s Endling takes us to Ukraine, where an eccentric scientist is breeding rare snails. And, Leif Enger’s I Cheerfully Refuse...dystopia with a twist.BOOKS Amy Taylor, Ruins, Allen & Unwin Maria Reva, Endl
AI in America, a kidnapping in Corsica, the transformative power of boxing: books by Gary Shteyngart, Darrow Farr, and Lucas Schaefer
Kate and Cassie discuss Vera, or Faith, Gary Shteyngart’s new novel about a ten-year-old Korean-American girl growing up in a dystopian United States. Alongside guest critics, they also look at The Bombshell by Darrow Farr, which traces the radicalisation of a young French woman in Corsica, and The Slip by Lucas Schaefer, the story of a missing teenage boy and the transformative
People turning into trees, mythical rivers rising...new novels by Rhett Davis and Gurnaik Johal (plus, Irish fiction with Colm Tóibín)
Australian author Rhett Davis re-imagines the everyday in his novels. In his latest, Arborescence, ordinary people begin transforming into trees. Is it a cult? Performance art? Or something else entirely? Also on the show: Guest reviewer Roanna Gonsalves discusses Saraswati, the debut novel by Gurnaik Johal, which winds its narrative around a sacred and possibly mythical river in
2025 Miles Franklin Literary Award assessed
A critical assessment of the shortlist and winner of Australia’s most prestigious literary award, The Miles Franklin Literary Award. Kate and Cassie are joined by guests, scholar and literary biographer (and former judge of the MFLA) Bernadette Brennan; and critic and publisher, Geordie Williamson.BOOKSBrian Castro, Chinese Postman, GiramondoMichelle de Kretser, Theory & Prac
Parties, scandals, sex, love: new novels by Nell Zink, Amy Bloom and the controversial James Frey
Parties, scandals, sex, love, families, friendship, death – these books have, as they say, all the things. Nell Zink’s Sister Europe moves through one night in Berlin, while Amy Bloom’s I’ll Be Right Here sweeps through 80 years of history, and in James Frey’s Next to Heaven, the beautiful and rich fall apart rather spectacularly.BOOKS Nell Zink, Sister Europe, Penguin Viking Amy
New Australian crime + hungry ghosts and a great white whale
Stories of the sea – and a great white whale in Xiaolu Guo's Call Me Ishmaelle; Hungry ghosts and kitchen mishaps in Daria Lavelle's NYC set novel Aftertaste; and the latest Australian crime fiction (of which there is a lot!)BOOKS AUSTRALIAN CRIME FICTION: Mark Brandi, Eden Paul Daley, The Leap Sam Guthrie, The Peak Angie Faye Martin, Melaleuca Michael Robotham, White Crow Tanya
Sydney Writer's Festival: The State of the Art of the Novel
What’s the state of fiction today? Four brilliant minds—Samantha Harvey (UK), Rumaan Alam (USA), Torrey Peters (USA), and Robbie Arnott (AUS)—tackle the question live at the 2025 Sydney Writers’ Festival. Expect bold takes, big ideas, and a few surprises.
Mystery in new fiction from Ben Okri, Sameer Pandya and Anjet Daanje
The same question is at the heart of three very different international novels on The Bookshelf this week, “What really happened”…To a WWI soldier who has forgotten his name and identity in The Remembered Soldier by Dutch author Anjet Daanje?To a fortune teller for the elite class in Ben Okri’s Madame Sosostris and the Festival for the Broken-hearted?When four high achieving Amer
Sweat, sport and sharp Australian satire; And the 2025 International Booker Prize winner
What would make a great Australian sporting novel? Our guests discuss translating the love of the game, footy nicknames, and intense team culture in ex-AFL player Brandon Jack’s Pissants.And making sport of the Melbourne literary scene, Dominic Amarena’s debut novel I Want Everything is a clever, celebratory satire. Kate and Cassie also review the 2025 International Booker Prize
Popular fiction across space and time, and queer bush doof thriller in Thomas Vowles' Our New Gods
The latest best-selling novels from Taylor Jenkins-Reid (Atmosphere) and Fredrik Backman (My Friends) explore 1980s astronauts, ambition and romance; and teenage anguish, friendship and art. Emotive and cinematic, how often is popular fiction written for the screen?Speaking of the screen, screenwriter Thomas Vowles’ debut novel Our New Gods takes us on a twisted psychological thr
Reading James Joyce's Ulysses for Bloomsday (and new fiction galore)
A guide to James Joyce from Irish writer Mary Morrissy, ahead of Bloomsday (16 June); New Zealand writer Becky Manawatu continues to explore howls of pain and compassion in her second novel, Kataraina; and magic realism in the boundaries between life and death, and Eastern Europe, in Helen Marshall's The Lady, the Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death. BOOKSJames Joyce, Ulysses (192
New fiction from Gail Jones, S A Cosby and Seán Hewitt
Fiction from all over the world, crossing genres, borders and ideas in American crime writer S A Cosby's King of Ashes, a gripping tale of family, smoke, and fire; Irish writer Sean Hewitt’s Open, Heaven, a beautifully woven story about longing, escape and memory; and, first up, The Name of the Sister, the latest from acclaimed Australian literary novelist Gail Jones.BOOKS Gail J
A vibrant gay coming-of-age story set in Geraldton
Kate and Cassie read W.A. writer Holden Sheppard's King of Dirt, a vibrant, gay coming-of-age story set in Geraldton. Plus, Australian author Jennifer Mills' new one, Salvage, in which we enter a very well drawn post apocalyptic Mad Max-ish world; and, Florence Knapp's The Names has been named one of the most anticipated fiction releases of the year, a sliding doors story leading
Sydney Writers' Festival: Top 100 Books launched with Alan Hollinghurst, Catherine Chidgey, Mariana Enriquez, Afra Atiq
What books have shaped the 21st century so far? Recorded live at the 2025 Sydney Writers’ Festival, literary heavyweights Catherine Chidgey (NZ), Mariana Enriquez (Argentina), and Alan Hollinghurst (UK) swap favourites, challenge conventions, and dive into the fiction and non-fiction that’s made a mark—and sparked debate.
On stage at Melbourne Writers' Festival with Hannah Kent and Beejay Silcox
A live recording from Melbourne Writers' Festival as Hannah Kent and Beejay Silcox sit down with Kate Evans and Jonathan Green to discuss the latest fiction releases they’re enjoying, loving and being challenged by. BOOKS- Hannah Kent, Always Home, Always Homesick, Picador- Eimear McBride, The City Changes its Face, Faber- Susan Choi, Flashlight, Jonathan Cape- Edward St Aubyn, P
A woman falls through the cracks of time in the first of Solvej Balle's seven-novel-series
One day lived over and over again with humour, despair and self-improvement is what we’re up against in Danish novelist Solvej Balle’s On The Calculation of Volume, a fictional work in seven volumes, the first volume (the one we’re talking about in this episode), has been shortlisted for the International Booker Prize. Plus, The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong, the poet and no
A beach holiday told four ways in Luke Horton's Time Together
Old friends gather together on the coast in Australian writer Luke Horton’s Time Together, Kate and Cassie take a look. Plus, Jo Harkin’s The Pretender, set during the time of the Tudors' ascent it tells the story of a little-known real-life figure; and Laura Elvery’s Nightingale, a re-imagining of the life of Florence Nightingale.BOOKS Luke Horton, Time Together, Scribe Jo Harki
James Bradley's Landfall reveals a flooded, baked and dilapidated city
Cities that are both flooded and on alert for the next storm in James Bradley’s Landfall. The body of a saint, dreamily and weirdly listening to everyone around her in Western Australia, in Josephine Rowe’s Little World. And from Malaysia, Tash Aw's The South, in which a family has left the city to head to a failing orchard, a story of longing, promise, generations, and misunders
The Bookshelf Easter Special: Irish writer Niall Williams
Irish writer Niall Williams with Kate Evans at the 2025 Adelaide Writers Week — with a focus on his Faha novels, History of the Rain, This is Happiness and (his latest) Time of the Child.Williams is also a screenwriter, playwright and travel writer — and his first novel, Four Letters of Love, has just been released as a film.He also appeared onstage at AWW with Kate and Cassie, f
A love triangle set against the beauty of Montana in Eric Puchner's Dream State
Families, secrets, mysteries, war...Kate and Cassie read Eric Puchner’s Dream State, an American saga that spans fifty years and is set against the expansive beauty of Montana; mysterious encounters and marital strife between an actor and an art critic in New York in Katie Kitamura’s Audition, and a World War II story set in an apartment block in Brussels in Alice Austen’s 33 Pla
Folk horror, dreams under surveillance, lonely in Guatemala
Cassie McCullagh is on leave this week, so Kate Evans and guests read Lucy Rose’s The Lamb, Laila Lalami’s The Dream Hotel, and Rachel Morton’s The Sun was Electric Light (with interview extracts from Lucy Rose on body horror and Cumbrian folk traditions, and from Rachel Morton on her move from poetry to prose).BOOKS Rachel Morton, The Sun was Electric Light, UQP Lucy Rose, The L
Andrea Goldsmith's The Buried Life - and a train steaming towards disaster . . .
Kate and Cassie read three new works of fiction, with the help of two guest reviewers: a novel of ideas, death, love and music, in Australian writer Andrea Goldsmith's The Buried Life; a real train derailment from the 1890s hurtles together rail workers, coffee sellers, anarcho-feminism, art and typewriters in Irish-Canadian writer Emma Donoghue's The Paris Express (read with his
Curtis Sittenfeld's Show Don't Tell + Tim Rogers and Zan Rowe on two new debuts
Kate and Cassie discuss bestselling American writer Curtis Sittenfeld’s sharp and observant collection of short stories Show Don’t Tell; You Am I frontman Tim Rogers reads First Name Second Name, an excellent debut from Queensland novelist Steve MinOn, and the ABC’s own Zan Rowe (of Triple J, Double J and Take 5 fame) shares her thoughts on Scottish singer-songwriter (from Belle
This week’s novels takes us to Zanzibar, Budapest and Renaissance Florence
This week’s novels takes us to Zanzibar, Budapest and Renaissance Florence with Nobel Prize-winning English-Tanzanian writer Abdulrazak Gurnah’s Theft; while guest reviewers Tim Ayliffe reads Laurent Binet’s Perspectives; and Siang Lu reads David Szalay’s Flesh.BOOKS Abdulrazak Gurnah, Theft, Bloomsbury Laurent Binet, Perspectives (translated from the French by Sam Taylor), Harvi
On stage at Adelaide Writers' Week with Niall Williams, Charlotte Mendelson and Brian Castro
This edition of the Bookshelf was recorded on stage at Adelaide Writers' Week on Sunday 2 March – with Irish writer Niall Williams (Time of the Child), English writer Charlotte Mendelson (Wife) and all the way from the Adelaide Hills, Australian writer Brian Castro (Chinese Postman). How and when do they do their best reading, what have books meant to them, what are their influen
Australian bestseller Diana Reid returns with Signs of Damage
Four women’s lives intertwined between Africa and the USA in Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Dream Count. Plus, secrets and trauma in the South of France in Australian novelist Diana Reid’s new one, Signs of Damage; and into the Swedish wilderness to observe a group of seven unlikely people in indie musician turned novelist Annika Norlin’s Colony.BOOKSChimamanda Ngozi
Irish writer Colum McCann’s Twist dives deep under the ocean and takes on a charismatic mystery
Irish writer Colum McCann’s Twist dives deep under the ocean and takes on a charismatic mystery; 2024 Nobel Prize winner Han Kang’s We Do Not Part explores massacres on Jeju Island during (and after) the Korean War, stories actively repressed by both the South Korean and American governments; and Australian novelist Charlotte McConaghy’s Wild Dark Shore takes us to a fictional is
Mothers and Sons...is the story as fraught as the title suggests?
An examination of family dynamics through three novels...Adam Haslett’s Mothers and Sons reflects on unspoken stories and familial divides; The Boy from the Sea by Garrett Carr, set in 1970s Ireland, tells the story of a family that takes in a child washed ashore, and Robert Lukins’ Somebody Down There Likes Me depicts an uber-rich family who gather together as their wealth and c
Alaska, folktales, mothers and daughters
Alaska, folktales and mothers and daughters in Eowyn Ivey's Black Woods Blue Sky. Pulitzer Prize–winning writer Anne Tyler is back with Three Days in June, another novel about mothers and daughters; and Italian novelist Vincenzo Latronico's Perfection, a critique of social media and contemporary life.BOOKSEowyn Ivey, Black Woods, Blue Sky, Tinder PressAnne Tyler, Three Days in Ju
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