The allure of erotic romance – a guest blog from bestselling author Amanda McIntyre

Posted on May 17, 2013 by Haylee Nash

Bestselling erotic romance author Amanda McIntyre writes about getting hooked by the hot stuff.

I was asked to write a few words on what the allure of erotic romance is. I’ve written it of course, or a version of it that my editors seem to like at any rate. But what I’ve discovered is that between publishers and readers the definition of “erotic romance” is a bit blurred—or so it seems.

There is the term “erotic” which, by Webster’s definition, means, “having to do with sexual love.” Then you have “romance”—interestingly, there are a number of definitions for this one: 1) a medieval tale of knightly adventure; 2) a prose narrative dealing with heroic or mysterious events set in a remote time or place; and, the most popular in fiction writing, I think, 3) a love story or attachment or episode between lovers.

Now I’d like to make clear one thing, erotic romance is not to be confused with “erotica”, which is a horse of a completely different colour!

risky-businessSo, what is its allure? What keeps readers gobbling up romances that feature the sizzling heat between hero and heroine? I say it’s the same thing that has continued to make romance books the leading seller of over half of all book sales (at least in the United States)! Are we really so different as readers, searching for that fantasy hero, getting lost in the trials and obstacles of a story where the passion and emotion radiate off every page? It’s wanting that connection to what makes us feel good, makes us feel alive, makes us feel like anything is possible—if only for a few moments in the often chaotic and not-so-loving world we live in.the-master-the-muses

Erotic romance, in my opinion, is not about the euphemistic terms, the bondage aspects or other kinky aspects that are added to stories to create varied levels of heat. To me, the label was created to introduce the reading public to a stronger, more candid style of writing romance. These days, you can pick up nearly any book—save maybe YA and Inspirational—that features as much, if not in some cases more, of the sizzling sex between characters as those labelled “erotic romance.”

I think the important thing to do as a reader is to keep an open mind. Sample a wide variety of books, and see what heat level suits your tastes. Certainly, there are enough levels of erotic romance out there!

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Amanda’s passion is in taking the ordinary and creating something extraordinary. Her work is published internationally, in audio, in e-book and in print.  She currently writes steamy contemporary and historical romance.

Filed under: Book retailing trends, Book Talk, Booktopia, Erotic Fiction, Fiction, Historical Romance, Publishing, Romance, TRENDS, Writing Style | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

From Brooklyn to Big Sur – From Booktopia’s Editorial Director Caroline Baum

Posted on May 13, 2013 by Andrew Cattanach

Booktopia’s Editorial Director Caroline Baum lets us in on her amazing bookish US adventure

Good to see Anna Funder settled in Park Slope, Brooklyn, in a street that feels like something out of Henry James. It was used to shoot a TV adaptation of Dickens’ A Winter’s Tale a few months ago, and they laid down fake snow. Each house has an individual gas lamp in its front yard. I have no idea why, but it certainly creates a special ambiance.

Caroline with Jackie Collins

A few days later, I went to Soho to hear current NY It Girl Rachel Kushner talk about her latest novel The Flamethrowers, which is getting rave  reviews. In its, she writes about motorcycles, contemporary art and Italian terrorism. Apparently it’s a bold ambitious book, and Jonathan Franzen is a fan. There was packed house for this midweek event on a cold night. Standing room only in fact. Kushner, who is droll and cool, was in conversation with fellow author,  Joshua Ferris who told such a long personal anecdote to open the event that I thought oh no, he’s never going to ask her a question, but eventually, he got round to a few and she had the confidence to go where she wanted to go. So now that book is on my Must Read list.

I went to meet with Elizabeth Strout, who won the Pulitzer for her novel Olive Kitteridge. She lives right down on the Hudson at FDR drive, and her new book The Burgess Boys is all about two brothers from Maine, both of them lawyers, but that’s where the similarities end. I’ll be writing about her for The Sydney Morning Herald in a month or so.

In San Francisco, I just had to go and see City Lights, the legendary bookshop where Ferlinghetti, Kerouac, Ginsberg and the Beat Generation hung out in the sixties. There, I became entranced by a blonde in a green synthetic fur hat. Her partner wore a headpiece in the shape of  Nemo the fish but I could not photograph him unobtrusively  whereas she was unaware, sitting and reading amongst the bookcases.

When we set out for Big Sur,  we drove  along the edge of Steinbeck country, near the town of Salinas, where John Steinbeck grew up and which now houses a scholarly research centre with public displays  dedicated to the author’s life.  The land around Salinas is close to the sea but fertile,  a patchwork of  fields of peas, strawberries and tall artichokes (Trivia: Marilyn Monroe was once crowned queen at the local artichoke fair.)

The view from Luke Davies porch in LA

Sadly, Steinbeck’s house is only open to the public from the month of June onwards so we pushed on to Big Sur, along the majestic wild coast. I had no idea it was a place that many writers had loved, including  Hunter S. Thompson, Richard Brautigan and Henry Miller, purveyor of explicit sex in books like Sexus, lover of Anais Nin, and others. The area boasts a Henry Miller Library which is pretty disappointing when you get there, it’s just a hippie compound with a bookshop in it, but there’s noting authentic about the place. A sign at the door confesses that the house never belonged to Miller.

And so on to LA, where  what else would you do to get a flavour of the glamour but go and visit Jackie Collins, which is exactly what I did. She lives in Beverly Hills of course and has a new book out in September, which is when she will be visiting Perth and Sydney, so watch out for that faux leopard! I’ll let you know when  my interview with her will come out but in the meantime here is a snap of us together in her very smart library.

By way of contrast, I was going to call on poet  and novelist Luke Davies, but our schedules got tangled and I ended up sitting on the rocking horse on his porch while he was out doing errands. It was a nice rocking chair, looking out on to a quiet street on the edge of Korea town and lined with those ludicrously tall palm trees, as you can see in this snap. Luke will be back in Australia for SWF 2013 to launch a new collection of his poetry.

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Caroline Baum is Booktopia’s Editorial Director.

She has worked as founding editor of Good Reading magazine, features editor for Vogue, presenter of ABC TV’s popular bookshow, Between the Lines, and Foxtel’s Talking Books, and as an executive producer with ABC Radio National.

You can follow her on twitter at @mscarobaum

Filed under: Book Recommendations, Book Talk, Caroline Baum | Tagged: | Leave a Comment »

Eccentricity – Curse or Ally?

Posted on May 1, 2013 by Andrew Cattanach

The 19th century British philosopher John Stuart Mill once remarked, “The amount of eccentricity in a society has generally been proportional to the amount of genius, mental vigor, and moral courage it contained. That so few now dare to be eccentric marks the chief danger of the time.”

The world of writing is filled with just the eccentric folk Mill was talking about. We’ve picked 10 examples of some of the greatest writers having some strange sides to them. Enjoy.

J.M Barrie

The creator of Peter Pan would always order Brussels sprouts for lunch, but he never ate them. When asked the reason for this, he replied, “I just love saying the words.”

Samuel Johnson

Once called “the most distinguished man of letters in English history”, Johnson often shaved all the hairs off his body and document how long it would take for them to grow back again.

Charles Dickens

One of the greatest writers to ever live, Dickens used to get so excited performing his own work in front of audiences that he would faint.

Rudyard Kipling

The much-loved writer behind The Jungle Book would paint all of his golf balls red so he could play in the snow.

H.G. Wells

The father of Science-Fiction always carried two pens with him; a big one for long words and a smaller one for the little words.

Dorothy Parker

The Queen of Satire once bought herself a new typewriter for no better reason than the fact the ribbon on her old ran out and she didn’t know how to install the new one.

Percy Bysshe Shelley

Despite his writing being one of Gandhi’s greatest inspirations to the path of passive resistance, Shelley hated cats so much that he once tied one to a kite in a thunderstorm in the hopes of seeing it electrocuted. (Poor Kitty!)

Giacomo Casanova

Literally the original Casanova, the womaniser used to grow the nail on his pinkie extra long specially so he could pick earwax out with it.

Thomas De Quincey

Would be so immersed in his writing (and perhaps other things) at night he set himself on fire more than once from the candle at his desk.

Samuel Beckett

Once said to an actor in one of his plays (regarding a pregnant pause in his script): “You’re playing two dots at the moment, the script calls for three!”

Do you know any other examples of writers going a bit balmy? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Filed under: Book Talk, Booktopia, Fiction, Non Fiction, Writing Style, Writing tips | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Women dominate the 2013 Miles Franklin shortlist

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Andrew Cattanach

Last year’s winner All That I Am by Anna Funder

The shortlist for this year’s Miles Franklin Literary Award features five books by Australian women, with this year’s winner due to receive $60,000, up from $50,000 last year. Last year’s award was presented to Anna Funder for All That I Am. This year’s shortlist features three debut novels—Floundering by Romy Ash, The Beloved by Annah Faulkner and The Mountain by Drusilla Modjeska—and one previously shortlisted author, Carrie Tiffany, who was a finalist for the 2006 Miles Franklin Literary Award for Everyman’s Rules for Scientific Living. Ash, de Kretser and Tiffany were also longlisted for the inaugural Stella Prize, which was awarded to Tiffany for Mateship with Birds in March.

Richard Neville from the State Library of New South Wales said the five novels on this year’s shortlist share a common theme. ‘The five novels … are at a surface level all about family—the searching for their comfort, the crises when they fail, escaping their pervasive grasp, or the despair when they do not seem possible—but more deeply, these books write about the intersection of people’s lives with national, indeed international, stories and ideas,’ said Neville. ‘Each approaches their subject from very different perspectives, but all deliver complex, engrossing narratives which persist long after the books are closed.’

You can see the full shortlist in detail below. If you haven’t read any of these wonderful books, grab a copy today and choose your winner before the judges do.

Floundering

by Romy Ash

Tom and Jordy have been living with their gran since the day their mother, Loretta, left them on her doorstep and disappeared.

Now Loretta’s returned, and she wants her boys back.

Tom and Jordy hit the road with Loretta in her beat-up car. The family of three journeys across the country, squabbling, bonding, searching and reconnecting.

But Loretta isn’t mother material. She’s broke, unreliable, lost. And there’s something else that’s not quite right with this reunion.

They reach the west coast and take refuge in a beachside caravan park. Their neighbour, a surly old man, warns the kids tostay away. But when Loretta disappears again the boys have no choice but to askthe old man for help, and now they face new threats and new fears.

This beautifully written and gripping debut is as moving as it is frightening, and as heartbreaking as it is tender.

About the Author

Romy Ash is a Melbourne-based writer. She has written for GriffithREVIEW, the Big Issue and frankie magazine. She has a regular cooking column in Yen magazine and writes for the blog Trotski & Ash. The forthcoming Voracious: New Australian Food Writing features one of her essays.

Floundering is her first novel.

Click here to buy Floundering from Booktopia, Australia’s Local Bookstore

Questions of Travel

by Michelle de Kretser

A dazzling, compassionate and deeply moving novel from one of world literature’s rising stars.

A mesmerising literary novel, Questions of Travel charts two very different lives. Laura travels the world before returning to Sydney, where she works for a publisher of travel guides. Ravi dreams of being a tourist until he is driven from Sri Lanka by devastating events.

Around these two superbly drawn characters, a double narrative assembles an enthralling array of people, places and stories – from Theo, whose life plays out in the long shadow of the past, to Hana, an Ethiopian woman determined to reinvent herself in Australia.

Award-winning author Michelle de Kretser illuminates travel, work and modern dreams in this brilliant evocation of the way we live now. Wonderfully written, Questions of Travel is an extraordinary work of imagination – a transformative, very funny and intensely moving novel.

About the Author

Michelle de Kretser was born in Sri Lanka and emigrated to Australia when she was 14. Educated in Melbourne and Paris, Michelle has worked as a university tutor, an editor and a book reviewer.

She is the author of The Rose Grower, The Hamilton Case, which won the Commonwealth Prize (SE Asia and Pacific region) and the UK Encore Prize, and The Lost Dog, which was widely praised by writers such as AS Byatt, Hilary Mantel and William Boyd and won a swag of awards, including: the 2008 NSW Premier’s Book of the Year Award and the Christina Stead Prize for Fiction, and the 2008 ALS Gold Medal.

The Lost Dog was also shortlisted for the Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction, the Western Australian Premier’s Australia-Asia Literary Award, the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize (Asia-Pacific Region) and Orange Prize’s Shadow Youth Panel. It was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Orange Prize for Fiction.

Click here to buy Questions of Travel from Booktopia, Australia’s Local Bookstore

Mateship with Birds

by Carrie Tiffany

On the outskirts of an Australian country town in the 1950s, a lonely farmer trains his binoculars on a family of kookaburras that roost in a tree near his house. Harry observes the kookaburras through a year of feast, famine, birth, death, war, romance and song. As Harry watches the birds, his next door neighbour has her own set of binoculars trained on him. Ardent, hard-working Betty has escaped to the country with her two fatherless children. Betty is pleased that her son, Michael, wants to spend time with the gentle farmer next door. But when Harry decides to teach Michael about the opposite sex, perilous boundaries are crossed.

Mateship with Birds is a novel about young lust and mature love. It is a hymn to the rhythm of country life – to vicious birds, virginal cows, adored dogs and ill-used sheep. On one small farm in a vast, ancient landscape, a collection of misfits question the nature of what a family can be.

About the Author

Carrie Tiffany was born in West Yorkshire and grew up in Western Australia. She spent her early twenties working as a park ranger in the Red Centre and now lives in Melbourne, where she works as an agricultural journalist. Her first novel, Everyman’s Rules for Scientific Living (2005) was shortlisted for numerous awards including the Orange Prize, the Miles Franklin Literary Award, the Guardian First Book Award and the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize, and won the Dobbie Award for Best First Book (2006) and the 2006 Western Australian Premier’s Award for Fiction. Mateship with Birds is her second novel.

Click here to buy Mateship with Birds from Booktopia, Australia’s Local Bookstore

The Beloved

by Annah Faulkner

“It came one morning with the milk, and it seemed – at first – almost as innocent…”

When Roberta “Bertie” Lightfoot is crippled by polio, her world collapses. But Mama doesn’t tolerate self-pity, and Bertie is nobody if not her mother’s daughter – until she sets her heart on becoming an artist. Through art, the gifted and perceptive Bertie gives form and voice to the reality of the people and the world around her. While her father is happy enough to indulge Bertie’s driving passion, her mother will not let art get in the way of a professional career.

In 1955 the family moves to post-colonial Port Moresby, a sometimes violent frontier town, where Bertie, determined to be the master of her own life canvas, rebels against her mother’s strict control. She thrives amid a vibrant new tropical palette, secretly learning the techniques of drawing and painting under the tutelage of her mother’s arch rival.

But Roberta is not the only one deceiving her family. As secrets come to light, the domestic varnish starts to crack, and jealousy and passion threaten to forever mar the relationship between mother and daughter.

Tender and witty, The Beloved is a moving debut novel which paints a vivid portrait of both the beauty and the burden of unconditional love.

About the Author

Sporadic bursts of poetry and occasional short stories defined Annah’s early writing. In 1996 experiences from a career in acupuncture prompted her to write a non-fiction manual. This was followed by a humorous biography, Frankly Speaking, which enjoyed considerable success in Australia and New Zealand. In 2007 her story, The Blood of Others, was published by the American literary journal Antipodes. Annah and her husband split their time between Queensland’s Sunshine Coast and the South Island of New Zealand. She is presently working on her second novel.

Click here to buy The Beloved from Booktopia, Australia’s Local Bookstore

The Mountain

by Drusilla Modjeska

In 1968 in Papua New Guinea there is excitement and violence on the streets. The country is on the brink of independence, but many Papuans are disillusioned with the pace of change, and the tension in Port Moresby is palpable. Amidst the turmoil, Leonard, an anthropologist, arrives with his alluring Dutch wife, Rika. Leonard wants to film villagers from a remote settlement in the mountains, and take Rika with him – the first white woman to go up there. But his new colleagues have other ideas.

Rika befriends two young women from the new university: Laedi, a Papuan with a local mother and Australian father, and Martha, a sweet-natured Australian student. But it is to Aaron and Jacob – two very different clan-brothers – to whom Rika is most dangerously drawn. Her relationship with these two men will change her and Leonard’s lives for ever.

Thirty years later, Jericho, a young art historian, travels from London to Port Moresby to try to make sense of his muddled past, of his birthplace on the mountain in 1968, and to bring back with him the girl he has loved since he was a boy.

About the Author

In 1971 Drusilla Modjeska moved to Australia, and within that decade graduated with a BA (Hons) in History from the Australian National University and a PhD in History from the University of New South Wales. Exiles At Home, her first book, was published in 1981. Poppy (1990), a ‘fictional biography’ of her mother, won the National Book Council Banjo Award for Non-Fiction, the NSW Premier’s Douglas Stewart Prize for Non-Fiction and was shortlisted for the Fawcett and PEN International Awards. The Orchard (1994) also won the NSW Premier’s Douglas Stewart Award for Non-Fiction and the Nita Kibble Literary Award, as did Stravinsky’s Lunch (1999), which explored the lives of the Australian modernist artists Grace Cossington Smith and Stella Bowen.

Click here to buy The Mountain from Booktopia, Australia’s Local Bookstore

The winner of this year’s award will be announced on 19 June at the National Library of Australia in Canberra. To see a list of all the titles longlisted for this year’s award, click here.

Source: Bookseller + Publisher (http://www.booksellerandpublisher.com.au/DetailPage.aspx?type=item&id=27014)

Filed under: Australian Author, Book Recommendations, Book Talk, Contemporary Literature, Fiction, Literary Prizes | Tagged: | Leave a Comment »

The Rosie Project — An Autism Mum’s Review

Posted on April 19, 2013 by Andrew Cattanach

The Rosie Project has been a publishing phenomenon, melting the hearts of readers everywhere with its unconventional love story. Benison O’Reilly, the co-author of The Australian Autism Handbook, casts an informed eye over the bestseller from Graeme Simsion.

The Rosie Project — a debut novel sold to over 30 countries and welcomed with seemingly universal glowing reviews. We could hardly forgive its author, Graeme Simsion, if not for the fact he’s in his 50s and has written such a beguiling book.

For the unenlightened, The Rosie Project tells the story of Don Tillman, a 39-year old professor of genetics, who’s been less than successful in love. Tired of leaving things to chance, he embarks on The Wife Project, designing a 16-page ‘best practice’ questionnaire to help him find the perfect mate. Into his life enters Rosie Jarman. She’s a thoroughly unsuitable candidate for The Wife Project, but is on a quest to find her biological father and Don, with his knowledge of genetics, is perfectly equipped to help. We know that Don and Rosie will end up together, although predictably their romance faces several obstacles along the way.

What makes their romance different is that Don has Asperger’s syndrome, a form of high-functioning autism.

Novels based around characters with Asperger’s are hardly new; Mark Haddon’s award-winning The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is the best known example. But a romance where the central character has Asperger’s — well, that’s more of a leap.

Benison O’Reilly

For me the interest was personal; my youngest son is on the autism spectrum. Could Simsion produce a convincing portrait of Don, cast him as the romantic hero, yet still capture his Aspergian essence? The answer, it turns out, is yes.

Don’s quirks are a major source of humour in the book, particularly the legendary ability of folks on the spectrum to ‘call a spade a spade’. Somehow, however, we’re never laughing at Don, probably because the book is written in the first-person. Once we start seeing the world through Don’s eyes it’s almost impossible not get drawn into his particular brand of logic.

When an opportunity arises for Don to have sex with Rosie he approaches the challenge in a typically systematic way. He procures a book about sexual positions and starts practising in his office, with help of a skeleton on loan from the Anatomy Department. This encounter of Don’s with best friend Gene was one of many laugh-out-loud moments:

‘So why the stress?’ said Gene. ‘You have had sex before?’

‘Of course,’ I said. ‘My doctor is strongly in favour.’

‘Frontiers of medical science,’ said Gene.

He was probably making a joke. I think the value of regular sex has been known for some time.

I explained further. ‘It’s just that adding a second person makes it more complicated.’

Yet, two-thirds into the book I became anxious. Firstly that, for the sake of the comedy, Simsion might choose to sanitise the reality of Asperger’s, to gloss over the very real challenges that individuals on the spectrum have to face.  But on that count he didn’t disappoint. He alluded, realistically, to darker time in Don’s life, treatment for a mental health condition in his early twenties.

Then, near the end, when Don bought some new clothes and refined his social skills, I worried that he was somehow going to lose his Aspie-ness. Relax! It turned out Don was just playing a part to win over Rosie — he remained at heart the same old Don. Again, this is accurate. In maturity many individuals with high-functioning autism learn to fake it. They observe and imitate us ‘neurotypicals’ because it makes it easier to fit in, not because our behaviour actually makes much sense.

Rosie falls in love with Don because he offers stability, fidelity and kindness, and (after the makeover) a passing resemblance to Gregory Peck. When it comes to finding a mate you could definitely do worse.

But then I suppose I’m biased.

Click here to buy The Rosie Project from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

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Benison O’Reilly is the co-author of The Australian Autism Handbook. A new edition of the bestselling Handbook was released this month. You can follow her on twitter here.

Click here to buy the latest edition of Benison’s The Australian Autism Handbook

Filed under: Australian Author, Book Recommendations, Book Talk, Fiction, Guest Blog | Tagged: , , , | Leave a Comment »

Introducing Booktopia’s Romance Specialist Haylee Nash

Posted on April 18, 2013 by booktopiaguestblogger

Booktopia’s newly appointed full-time Romance Specialist Haylee Nash tells us about her love of the love of love.

A favourite of Haylee's

A favourite of Haylee’s

In year five, I was given ‘The Talk’.

At school that day, we’d just had a rather clinical explanation of the wheres, hows and what-fors of the birds and the bees, but I wanted details. My mother sat awkwardly on the end of my bed and asked if I had any questions.

“Just one.”

“And what’s that?”

“What does it feel like?”

Her answer sounded vaguely painful and distinctly undesirable which, looking back, I suppose was the point. And while I continued to like boys with the same ferocity I’d had since pre-school, I had no desire to do IT.

A Haylee recommendation

And then, in Year 9, I read a Mills & Boon. Man, my mum had it wrong! Not only could IT be way more fun than hanging out at the local Westfield or dancing to Christina Aguilera, but the men in these books were so much hotter than any of the boys at the inter-school Catholic dances. And in these books, unlike in the fairytales I’d grown up on, the women weren’t saved by the men, but rather the hero and heroine saved each other. Deep sigh.

In my early years at uni, I put aside Mills & Boon in favour of ‘real’ books – Stendhal’s The Red and the Black, The Consolation of Joe Cinque by Helen Garner, anything by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Some of which I even read! But when it was time to read a book purely for pleasure, I always picked up a romance – a Jane Green, a Cathy Kelly, a Stephanie Bond. Then it came time to find a topic for my honours thesis.

My friends were writing about the gaps in meaning in poetry in translation, and performances of gender in evangelical religion.  I was stumped. So I took a year out and worked in a shoe shop…and rediscovered Mills & Boon. It felt like coming home. I found my thesis topic. Reading and desire in Mills & Boon. I got first class honours and it felt like I was cheating – no essay had ever been so easily written. But that’s what happens when you write about what you love.

The rest is history.

I now fly the flag for all kinds of romance whenever possible. And I only read for pleasure – life’s too short to read for any other reason.

Oh, and the Mills & Boon authors were right. IT is lots of fun.

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Haylee Nash has been reading and raving about romance for 15 years. She has previously worked as the Publishing Manager at Harlequin Australia and during her time there launched the Harlequin Teen, Harlequin Spice and local acquisition programmes, as well as Harlequin’s digital-first romance imprint, Escape Publishing. Haylee is now the Romance Specialist at Booktopia.

You can follow her on twitter here.

Filed under: Book Recommendations, Book Talk, Booktopia, Guest Blog, Publishing, Romance, Writing tips | Tagged: , | 4 Comments »

The 2013 Women’s Prize for Fiction shortlist announced

Posted on April 18, 2013 by Andrew Cattanach

The awards news just keeps on coming, with the shortlist for the 2013 Women’s Prize for Fiction announced.

For those that like a familiar face, this is a party you’ll enjoy. Literary juggernaut Hilary Mantel is joined by multiple award-winners Zadie Smith and Barbara Kingsolver.

There’s also some new blood, with the author of the brilliant Life After Life Kate Atkinson getting a nod, alongside other newbies A.M. Homes and Maria Semple. Newbies in terms of Women’s Prize shortlistings, but all wonderful, seasoned authors in their own right.

The bookies have Hilary Mantel as an early favourite, with Kate Atkinson and Barbara Kingsolver also fancied. For trivia buffs, on the other two occasions Hilary Mantel has been shortlisted for The Women’s Prize for Fiction, she has been pipped at the post by authors in this year’s field. Zadie Smith for On Beauty in 2006, and Barbara Kingsolver for The Lacuna. Mantel was shortlisted for Beyond Black and Wolf Hall in those years.

So sit back and check out our profiles of the wonderful books shortlisted for this prestigious award. The winner will be announced on Wednesday 5th June 2013, giving you plenty of time to read these beauties and choose your own winner.

You can also see the books that were longlisted for the Prize here.

Life After Life

by Kate Atkinson

In 1910, Ursula Todd is born during a snowstorm in England, but two parallel scenarios occur – in one, she dies immediately. In the other, she lives to tell the tale. As the possibility of having a second chance at life opens up, the novel unfolds, following Ursula as she lives through the events of the twentieth century again and again. What if you had the chance to live your life again and again, until you finally got it right? During a snowstorm in England in 1910, a baby is born and dies before she can take her first breath.

During a snowstorm in England in 1910, the same baby is born and lives to tell the tale.

What if there were second chances? And third chances? In fact an infinite number of chances to live your life? Would you eventually be able to save the world from its own inevitable destiny? And would you even want to?

Life After Life follows Ursula Todd as she lives through the turbulent events of the last century again and again. With wit and compassion, she finds warmth even in life’s bleakest moments, and shows an extraordinary ability to evoke the past. Here is Kate Atkinson at her most profound and inventive, in a novel that celebrates the best and worst of ourselves.

About the Author

Kate Atkinson was born in York and now lives in Edinburgh. Her first novel, Behind the Scenes at the Museum, won the Whitbread Book of the Year Award and has been a critically acclaimed international bestselling author ever since.

She is the author of a collection of short stories, Not the End of the World, and of the critically acclaimed novels Human Croquet, Emotionally Weird, Case Histories, and One Good Turn.

Kate was awarded an MBE in the Queen’s 2011 Birthday Honours, for services to literature.

Click here to buy Life After Life from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

May We Be Forgiven

by A.M. Homes

Harry is a Richard Nixon scholar who leads a quiet, regular life; his brother George is a high-flying TV producer, with a murderous temper.They have been uneasy rivals since childhood.Then one day George loses control so extravagantly that he precipitates Harry into an entirely new life. In May We Be Forgiven, Homes gives us a darkly comic look at 21st century domestic life – at individual lives spiraling out of control, bound together by family and history.

The cast of characters experience adultery, accidents, divorce, and death. But this is also a savage and dizzyingly inventive vision of contemporary America, whose dark heart Homes penetrates like no other writer – the strange jargons of its language, its passive aggressive institutions, its inhabitants’ desperate craving for intimacy and their pushing it away with litigation, technology, paranoia.

At the novel’s heart are the spaces in between, where the modern family comes together to re-form itself. May We Be Forgiven explores contemporary orphans losing and finding themselves anew; and it speaks above all to the power of personal transformation – simultaneously terrifying and inspiring.

About the Author

A.M. Homes has been the recipient of numerous awards including Fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, NYFA, and The Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at The New York Public Library, along with the Benjamin Franklin Award.

She is the author of the novels, This Book Will Save Your Life, Music For Torching, The End of Alice, In a Country of Mothers, and Jack, as well as the short-story collections, Things You Should Know and The Safety of Objects, the best selling memoir, The Mistress’s Daughter along with a travel memoir, Los Angeles: People, Places and The Castle on the Hill, and the artist’s book Appendix A:

A.M. Homes was born in Washington D.C., she now lives in New York City and teaches in the Creative Writing Program at Princeton

Click here to buy May We Be Forgiven from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Flight Behaviour

by Barbara Kingsolver

Discontented with her life of poverty on a failing farm in the Eastern United States, Dellarobia, a young mother, impulsively seeks out an affair. Instead, on the Appalachian mountains above her farm, she discovers something much more profoundly life-changing – a beautiful and terrible marvel of nature. As the world around her is suddenly transformed by a seeming miracle, can the old certainties they have lived by for centuries remain unchallenged?

Flight Behaviour is a captivating, topical and deeply human novel touching on class, poverty and climate change. It is Barbara Kingsolver’s most accessible novel yet, and explores the truths we live by, and the complexities that lie behind them.

About the Author

Barbara Kingsolver’s thirteen books of fiction, poetry and non-fiction include the novels The Bean Trees and the international bestseller The Poisonwood Bible which, amongst other accolades, won the 2005 Penguin/Orange Reading Group Book of the Year award. Her most recent novel The Lacuna, won the Orange Prize for Fiction in 2010.

Click here to buy Like Flight Behaviour from
Booktopia, Australia’s Local Bookstore

Bring Up the Bodies

by Hilary Mantel

By 1535 Thomas Cromwell, the blacksmith’s son, is far from his humble origins. Chief Minister to Henry VIII, his fortunes have risen with those of Anne Boleyn, Henry’s second wife, for whose sake Henry has broken with Rome and created his own church. But Henry’s actions have forced England into dangerous isolation, and Anne has failed to do what she promised: bear a son to secure the Tudor line. When Henry visits Wolf Hall, Cromwell watches as Henry falls in love with the silent, plain Jane Seymour. The minister sees what is at stake: not just the king’s pleasure, but the safety of the nation. As he eases a way through the sexual politics of the court, its miasma of gossip, he must negotiate a ‘truth’ that will satisfy Henry and secure his own career. But neither minister nor king will emerge undamaged from the bloody theatre of Anne’s final days.

In Bring up the Bodies, sequel to the Man Booker Prize-winning Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel explores one of the most mystifying and frightening episodes in English history: the destruction of Anne Boleyn. This new novel is a speaking picture, an audacious vision of Tudor England that sheds its light on the modern world. It is the work of one of our great writers at the height of her powers.

About the Author

Hilary Mantel is one of our most important living writers. She is the author of twelve books, including A Place of Greater Safety, Giving Up the Ghost, Beyond Black, which was shortlisted for the 2006 Orange Prize, and Wolf Hall, which won the 2009 Man Booker Prize.

Click here to buy Bring up the Bodies from
Booktopia, Australia’s Local Bookstore

Where’d You Go, Bernadette

by Maria Semple

A wildly imaginative, laugh-out-loud but also very poignant novel.

Bernadette Fox is notorious. To Elgie Branch, a Microsoft wunderkind, she’s his hilarious, volatile, talented, troubled wife. To fellow mothers at the school gate, she’s a menace. To design experts, she’s a revolutionary architect. And to 15-year-old Bee, she is a best friend and, quite simply, mum.

Then Bernadette disappears. And Bee must take a trip to the end of the earth to find her.

Where’d You Go, Bernadette is a compulsively readable, irresistibly written, deeply touching novel about misplaced genius and a mother and daughter’s place in the world.

About the Author

Maria Semple worked in Los Angeles as a television writer for 15 years, working on hit shows including Ellen, Saturday Night Live, Mad About You and Arrested Development. She lives in Seattle.

Click here to buy Where’d You Go, Bernadette from
Booktopia, Australia’s Local Bookstore

NW

by Zadie Smith

Hobbes, Smith, Bentham, Locke and Russell.

Five identical blocks make up the Caldwell housing estate in North West London.

If you grew up in this relic of seventies urban design, the plan was to get out and get on, to something better, somewhere else. Thirty years later, Caldwell kids Leah, Natalie, Felix and Nathan have all moved on, with varying degrees of success – whatever that means. Living only streets apart, they occupy separate worlds, and navigate an atomized city in which few care to be their neighbour’s keeper.

Then one April afternoon a stranger comes to Leah’s door, seeking help, disturbing the peace, and forcing Leah out of her isolation . . .

From private houses to public parks, at work and at play, where the main streets hide the back alleys and taking the high road can sometimes lead you to a dead end, NW is a quietly devastating novel of encounters.

About the Author

Zadie Smith was born in north-west London in 1975, and continues to live in the area. White Teeth is her first novel and won awards for Best Book and Best Female Newcomer at the BT Emma Awards (Ethnic and Multicultural Media Awards), the Guardian First Book Award, the Whitbread Prize for a first novel in 2000, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction 2000, the WH Smith Book Award for New Talent, the Frankfurt eBook Award for Best Fiction Work Originally Published in 2000 and both the Commonwealth Writers First Book Award and Overall Commonwealth Writers Prize.

Her other novels are The Autograph Man and On Beauty, which was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2005 and won the Orange Prize for Fiction 2006. She also edited the collection of contemporary short fiction The Book of Other People, and wrote Changing My Mind, a collection of personal and cultural essays.

Click here to buy NW from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Filed under: Book Recommendations, Book Talk, Fiction, Literary Festivals, Literary Prizes, Publishing | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Carrie Tiffany wins the inaugural Stella Prize for women writers.

Posted on April 17, 2013 by Andrew Cattanach

Carrie Tiffany, author of the acclaimed Mateship With Birds, has been awarded the inaugural Stella Prize for women writers.

Named after one of Australia’s most important female authors, Stella Maria Miles Franklin, the Stella Prize is worth $50,000, and both fiction and non-fiction books are eligible.

The Melbourne based writer said after her win she would share part of her prizemoney with the five other shortlisted writers.

The Stella Prize was established to raise the profile of women authors.

“I don’t write particularly for women, I don’t write for any particular reader in mind,” Tiffany said.  “I write for myself, I think.”

But she welcomed the co-operative spirit of the Stella Prize, saying that women writers were supportive of each other.

She will share $10,000 of her prizemoney with Courtney Collins (The Burial), Michelle de Kretser (Questions of Travel), Lisa Jacobson (The Sunlit Zone), Cate Kennedy (Like a House on Fire) and Margo Lanagan (Sea Hearts).

Judging panel chairwoman Kerryn Goldsworthy said Tiffany had told an “original, tender, frank and funny version of the oldest story in the world: how a man and a woman get together.”

You can see our complete wrap of all the authors longlisted for The Stella Prize here.

You can also see our exclusive interview with Carrie Tiffany here.

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Mateship With Birds

by Carrie Tiffany

On the outskirts of an Australian country town in the 1950s, a lonely farmer trains his binoculars on a family of kookaburras that roost in a tree near his house. Harry observes the kookaburras through a year of feast, famine, birth, death, war, romance and song. As Harry watches the birds, his next door neighbour has her own set of binoculars trained on him. Ardent, hard-working Betty has escaped to the country with her two fatherless children. Betty is pleased that her son, Michael, wants to spend time with the gentle farmer next door. But when Harry decides to teach Michael about the opposite sex, perilous boundaries are crossed.

Mateship with Birds is a novel about young lust and mature love. It is a hymn to the rhythm of country life – to vicious birds, virginal cows, adored dogs and ill-used sheep. On one small farm in a vast, ancient landscape, a collection of misfits question the nature of what a family can be.

About The Author

Carrie Tiffany was born in West Yorkshire and grew up in Western Australia. She spent her early twenties working as a park ranger in the Red Centre and now lives in Melbourne, where she works as an agricultural journalist. Her first novel, Everyman’s Rules for Scientific Living (2005) was shortlisted for numerous awards including the Orange Prize, the Miles Franklin Literary Award, the Guardian First Book Award and the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize, and won the Dobbie Award for Best First Book (2006) and the 2006 Western Australian Premier’s Award for Fiction. Mateship with Birds is her second novel.

Click here to buy Mateship With Birds from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

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Filed under: Australian Author, Author Interview, Book Recommendations, Book Talk, Competitions, Fiction, Literary Prizes, Writing Style, Writing tips | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

2013 CBCA Awards shortlists announced

Posted on April 15, 2013 by Andrew Cattanach

The shortlists for this year’s Children’s Book Council of Australia (CBCA) Book of the Year Awards have been announced.

Already with a few awards this year, Margo Lanagan joins other award-winning authors like Jackie French, Morris Gleitzman and Margaret Wild in a wonderful field of authors and illustrators.

Older Readers

The Ink Bridge
by Neil Grant

A remarkable and gripping story about one refugee boy on a desperate journey from Afghanistan, and the Australian boy who befriends him.

The Ink Bridge is the compelling story of two young men: Omed, an Afghani refugee who flees the Taliban and undertakes a perilous journey to seek asylum in Australia; and Hector, an Australian boy afflicted by grief, who has given up on school and retreated into silence. Their paths meet at a candle factory where they both find work. But secrets fester behind the monotonous routine: secrets with terrible consequences.

Powerful and compelling, Omed’s and Hector’s story will grip hold of your heart and not let go.

Click here to buy The Ink Bridge from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Sea Hearts
by Margo Lanagan

A mesmerising selkie novel from multi-award winning, internationally acclaimed Australian author, Margo Lanagan – one of the most exciting voices in speculative fiction.

On remote Rollrock Island, the sea-witch Misskaella discovers she can draw a girl from the heart of a seal. So, for a price, any man might buy himself a bride; an irresistibly enchanting sea-wife. But what cost will be borne by the people of Rollrock – the men, the women, the children – once Misskaella sets her heart on doing such a thing?

Click here to buy Sea Hearts from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

The Shiny Guys
by Doug MacLeod

One night, the shiny guys visit fifteen-year-old Colin Lapsley. They don’t speak, but Colin can read their thoughts. They want him to pay for the terrible thing that he has done. When the shiny guys won’t go away, Colin is admitted to ward 44. There he discovers an alien world, a powerful weapon, a gentle giant, and a girl who may be able to see what he can see.

The Shiny Guys is a dark, sometimes funny novel about how fantasy and reality can merge, especially when electricity is involved.

Click here to buy The Shiny Guys from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Creepy & Maud
by Dianne Touchell

Hilarious and heartbreaking, Creepy & Maud charts the relationship between two social misfits, played out in the space between their windows.

Creepy is a boy who watches from the shadows keenly observing and caustically commentating on human folly.

Maud is less certain. A confused girl with a condition that embarrasses her parents and assures her isolation.

Together Creepy and Maud discover something outside their own vulnerability – each other’s.

Click here to buy Creepy & Maud from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Friday Brown
by Vikki Wakefield

Seventeen-year-old Friday Brown is on the run – running to escape memories of her mother and of the family curse. And of a grandfather who’d like her to stay. She’s lost, alone and afraid.

Silence, a street kid, finds Friday and she joins him in a gang led by beautiful, charismatic Arden. When Silence is involved in a crime, the gang escapes to a ghost town in the outback. In Murungal Creek, the town of never leaving, Friday must face the ghosts of her past. She will learn that sometimes you have to stay to finish what you started – and often, before you can find out who you are, you have to become someone you were never meant to be.

Friday Brown is the breathtaking second novel from the author of the award-winning All I Ever Wanted. Vikki Wakefield is an astonishing talent.

Click here to buy Friday Brown from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

The Wrong Boy
by Suzy Zail

Hanna is a talented pianist, and the protected second daughter of middle class Hungarian Jews. Relatively late in World War II the Budapest Jews were rounded up and sent to Auschwitz. Hanna and her mother and sister are separated from her father. Her mother becomes increasingly mentally ill until she too is taken away somewhere. Her sister Erika is slowly starving to death. Hanna is quite a naïve 15-year-old but when presented with the opportunity to play piano for the camp commander, she is desperate to be chosen.

She goes each day under guard to the commander’s house and stands waiting in case the commander should want some music. Also living in the house is the commander’s son, Karl. A handsome young man who seems completely disengaged from what is happening around him. Hanna hates him as he sits drawing in the music room. But the longer Hanna goes to the house, the more she realises there are other things going on. Secret things. Karl may not be the person she thinks he is. Before she knows it she has fallen in love with the wrong boy.

Click here to buy The Wrong Boy from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Younger Readers

Pennies for Hitler
by Jackie French

It’s 1939, and for Georg, son of an English academic living in Germany, life is full of cream cakes and loving parents. It is also a time when his teacher measures the pupils′ heads to see which of them have the most ‘Aryan’- shaped heads. But when a university graduation ceremony turns into a pro-Nazi demonstration, Georg is smuggled out of Germany to war-torn London and then across enemy seas to Australia where he must forget his past and who he is in order to survive.

Hatred is contagious, but Georg finds that kindness can be, too.

The companion book for Hitler’s Daughter, Pennies For Hitler examines the life of a child during World War 2, from a different perspective.

Click here to buy Pennies for Hitler from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Other Brother
by Simon French

Kieran wants to be part of the in-group at school. He wants to be on the football team. He wants to fit in. But then his cousin Bon turns up.

Bon doesn’t know anything about fitting in – he looks different, he wears the wrong clothes, and he says weird things.

Kieran just wants to ignore Bon, but soon he is forced to make a choice.

Which is more important – being popular, or doing the right thing?

Click here to buy Other Brother from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

After
by Morris Gleitzman

In the fourth part of Felix’s story, continuing his adventures in World War Two,.

In After, he faces perhaps his greatest challenge – to find hope when he’s lost almost everything, including his parents.

As Europe goes through the final agonizing stages of the war, Felix struggles to reconcile hatred and healing.

He’s helped by a new friend, but if he should lose her as well …

Click here to buy After from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Children of the King
by Sonya Hartnett

Three children have been sent to live in the countryside, safe from the war in London.

When they find two boys hiding in a castle, the past and future come together to make an extraordinary adventure.

A hauntingly beautiful story from one of Australia’s most acclaimed writers for adults and children.

Click here to buy Children of the King from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Pookie Aleera is Not My Boyfriend
by Steven Herrick

Award-winning author Steven Herrick’s latest book is a heart-warming tale about friendship, grief and the importance of baked goods.

In a country town, in a school just like yours, the kids in Class 6A tell their stories.
There’s Mick, school captain and sometimes trouble-maker, who wants to make the school a better place, while his younger brother Jacob just wants to fly. There’s shy and lonely Laura who hopes to finally fit in with a circle of friends, while Pete struggles to deal with his grandpa’s sudden death. Popular Selina obsesses over class comedian Cameron, while Cameron obsesses over Anzac biscuits and Pookie Aleera – whoever that is!

For new teacher Ms Arthur, it’s another world, but for Mr Korsky, the school groundskeeper, he’s seen it all before.

Click here to buy Pookie Aleera is Not My Boyfriend from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

The Tender Moments of Saffron Silk
by Glenda Millard & Stephen Michael King

Flame-haired Saffron is the youngest of the five Silk sisters. Her family know that she has a talent for becoming Anne of Green Gables or Cleopatra, and that she loves reading myths and legends. But they don’t know about the firebirds that come to warn her of terrible headaches. And Saffron doesn’t know how to tell them.

In a big family, it’s easy to be overlooked. But when Saffron is sent to the city to see a specialist, she learns that her family’s love for her is deeper than she ever imagined. And that when you’re a Silk, miracles are never far from home…

Another heart-warming story in Glenda Millard’s multi-award-winning Kingdom of Silk series.

Click here to buy The Tender Moments of Saffron Silk from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Early Childhood

The Terrible Suitcase
by Emma Allen & Freya Blackwood

What do you do when it’s your first day of school and your mum gives you a terrible suitcase instead of a red backpack with yellow rockets and a silver zipper?

Well, first you get mad.

M A D!

Then you use your imagination to build a rocket ship and escape with all your new friends.

Click here to buy The Terrible Suitcase from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

With Nan
by Tania Coz & Karen Blair

A leaf that flies…

A rock that hops…

These are some of the wonderful things that Simon sees on his walk with Nan.

Simon takes a walk through the bush with his Nan and along the way finds out that things are not always what they seem.

A simple story about camouflage is brought to life with the beautiful illustrations by Karen Blair

Click here to buy With Nan from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

The Pros & Cons of Being a Frog
by Sue DeGennaro

Finding the right animal wasn’t easy. It was Camille who finally gave me the idea of being a frog!

Frogboy and Camille are best friends but they are very different.

Camille speaks in numbers and Frogboy likes to dress up.

With Camille’s help he finds that dressing up as a frog is perfect for him, but when he tries to convince his friend to be a frog too, his plan goes terribly wrong.

Click here to buy The Pros & Cons of Being a Frog from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Too Many Elephants in This House
by Ursula Dubosarsky & Andrew Joyner

In Eric’s house there were too many elephants – in the living room, in the kitchen, in the bathroom, even in his bedroom!

The elephants take up a lot of space, but Eric loves every one of them. So when his mum says they have to go, Eric comes up with a clever solution to a very BIG problem . . .

From the creators of The Terrible Plop comes this delightfully energetic story, full of fun and exuberance.

Click here to buy Too Many Elephants in This House from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

It’s a Miroocool!
by Christine Harris & Ann James

Audrey lives in the outback, so when she loses her first tooth, she’s worried the tooth fairy will never find her! How will she let the tooth fairy know where she lives . . . and what will the tooth fairy leave her?

This is the same feisty and resourceful Audrey that readers have grown to love in the best-selling “Audrey of the Outback” series. A fabulous introduction for younger readers to the adored children’s fiction character Audrey of the Outback. A wonderfully optimistic story that captures the determined, mischievous, and imaginative nature of children.

Click here to buy It’s a Miroocool! from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Peggy
by Anna Walker

Peggy lives in a small house in a quiet street.

One blustery day a big gust of wind sweeps down and scoops up leaves, twigs and…Peggy!

The wind blows Peggy into the city, where she discovers strange new things, but how will she find her way back home?

Click here to buy Peggy from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Picture Books

The Coat
by Julie Hunt, Illustrated by Ron Brooks

Illustrated by Australia’s leading picture-book artist, this is a surprising and delicious story that will lift you off your feet and whirl you away. A coat in a strawberry patch flies off with a down-at-heel man, and together they have the night of their lives.

The Coat stood in a paddock at the end of a row of strawberries. It was buttoned up tight and stuffed full of straw and it was angry. ‘What a waste of me!’ it yelled. Then along came a man. ‘I could do with a coat like that,’ the man said. Together, swooping and swinging, they travelled to the Cafe Delitzia, and had the night of their lives

Click here to buy The Coat from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Tanglewood
by Margaret Wild, Illustrated by Vivienne Goodman

Tanglewood lives on an island far away, visited only by the wind.

One day a bird shelters from the storm among its branches and a precious bond is formed.

But Seagull belongs to the sky and, too soon, must leave.

Will she ever return?

Click here to buy Tanglewood from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Sophie Scott Goes South
by Alison Lester

Sophie Scott is only nine years old, but she’s going to Antarctica on an icebreaker with her dad, the ship’s captain. During the voyage to Mawson Station and back, Sophie keeps a diary. She sees icebergs, penguins, seals and whales. She makes new friends, experiences the southern lights and even becomes stranded in a blizzard!

Children’s Laureate and much-loved picture-book creator Alison Lester travelled to Antarctica as an Antarctic Arts Fellow. Her alter ego, Sophie Scott, goes on the same adventure in a friendly, informative and beautifully presented book that sees the wonder of Antarctica through a child’s eyes.

Click here to buy Sophie Scott Goes South from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Lightning Jack
by Glenda Millard, Illustrated by Patricia Mullins

When Sam Tully sees the free-spirited horse Lightning Jack, he dares to ride him. Together they muster a herd of steers into their stable, escape a grazier’s deal and fly into the air with Pegasus wings.

Then when they are ambushed by the notorious outlaw Ned Kelly, Lightning Jack leaps out of trouble and back to the wilderness.

But then Sam can’t resist a race and rides Lightning Jack against the ghost of Phar Lap at breakneck speed …Sam’s horse is a gallant horse, a midnight horse, a horse in every dream.

Click here to buy Lightning Jack from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

A Day to Remember
by Jackie French, Illustrated by Mark Wilson

Anzac Day is the day when we remember and honour ANZAC traditions down the ages, from the first faltering march of wounded veterans in 1916 to the ever-increasing numbers of their descendants who march today.

Containing reference to the many places the ANZACs have fought, and the various ways in which they keep the peace and support the civilians in war-torn parts of the world today, this is a picture book that looks not only at traditions, but also the effects of war.

Click here to buy A Day to Remember from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

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Filed under: Australian Author, Book Recommendations, Book Talk, Children's Books, Fiction, Literary Prizes, Non Fiction, Publishing | Tagged: , | 1 Comment »

Fairytales For Wilde Girls by Allyse Near – A review by Isabel Blackmore (age twelve)

Posted on April 14, 2013 by Andrew Cattanach

There’s nothing like a kid’s review for a kids book.

One of Booktopia’s younger friends, Isabel Blackmore, shares her thoughts on the upcoming Fairytales For Wilde Girls by Allyse Near.

Fairytales for Wilde Girls has taken me on a journey that no other book has before.

It puts you on a wondrous rollercoaster, taking you on unexpected twists and turns. Even a simple sentence has stupendous meaning behind it.

The story is about a girl – Isola Wilde – who is a Child of Nimue, allowing her to see the dead.

Her life changes forever once she sees the dead girl In the forest.

She then appears at Isola’s window that night, her every word a threat.

Her six brother princes must do everything they can to help Isola, before it’s too late.

Fairytales for Wilde Girls is unbelievably well written, it becomes indescribable.

This amazing ride never stops, even when the book is finished, and it never will.

Click here to pre-order Fairytales for Wilde Girls from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

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Thanks to Isabel for her wonderful review, hopefully a promise of more to come. You can find her on twitter when her parents give her permission.
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Click to buy Fairytales for Wilde GirlsFairytales For Wilde Girls

by Allyse Near

A deliciously dark bubblegum-gothic fairytale from a stunning new Australian talent.

‘He’s gone the same way as those little birds that bothered me with their awful songs! And you will too, you and your horrible heart-music, because you won’t stay out of my woods!’

There’s a dead girl in a birdcage in the woods. That’s not unusual.

Isola Wilde sees a lot of things other people don’t. But when the girl appears at Isola’s window, her every word a threat, Isola needs help.

Her real-life friends – Grape, James and new boy Edgar – make her forget for a while. And her brother-princes – the mermaids, faeries and magical creatures seemingly lifted from the pages of the French fairytales Isola idolises – will protect her with all the fierce love they possess.

It may not be enough. Isola needs to uncover the truth behind the dead girl’s demise and appease her enraged spirit, before the ghost steals Isola’s last breath.

About the Author

Born in 1989, Allyse Near counts Neil Gaiman, Angela Carter, Francesca Lia Block and the Brothers Grimm among her biggest literary influences. She obtained a Bachelor of Arts from Deakin University, majoring in Professional and Creative Writing, and won Deakin’s inaugural Judith Rodriguez Prize for Fiction for her short story Venus In The Twelfth House while in her second year. Throughout 2010 she was mentored by multiple-Aurealis Award-winning author Jane Routley, and published short stories in a number of literary journals, including Verandah, Short and Twisted, and Etchings. Allyse writes deconstructed pulp-fairytales that almost always revolve around women, the wilderness and witchcraft. Her debut novel is Fairytales for Wilde Girls. She is currently studying at Ballarat University and working on a YA novel she describes as Snow White-meets-Rosemary’s Baby.

Click here to pre-order Fairytales for Wilde Girls from Booktopia,
Australia’s Local Bookstore

Filed under: Australian Author, Book Recommendations, Book Talk, Children's Books, Coming Soon, Fiction | Tagged: , , | Leave a Comment »

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