Category: Genre

Wandering Stars – Tommy Orange


This is a brilliant follow-up to Orange’s There There with some of the same characters. The first part of the book is historical, the legacies of the Sand Creek massacre of 1864 and the Carlisle Industrial School for Indians. Misguided attempts at assimilation by governments and adoptions are devoted to the eradication of Native history, culture and identity. The next section of the book entitled Aftermath is even better, detailing the brutal reality of contemporary life in Oakland for two grandmothers and their three grandsons. When is life more than surviving?

This book is both shattering and wondrous – highly recommended.

The Husbands – Holly Gramazio


Lauren returns to her London flat to discover her husband Michael but … she is not married! When Michael enters the attic, a different “husband” emerges. Amazingly, her attic is capable of creating an infinite supply of husbands so Lauren recycles them, looking for an ideal (or acceptable) married relationship. This is an original and totally entertaining book.

Before The Coffee Gets Cold – Toshikazu Kawaguchi


A small basement cafe in Tokyo offers time travel, to travel back in time subject to specific rules. For example, nothing that is done in the past can change the present, and the duration of the trip is brief, limited to as long as it takes for a cup of coffee to become cold. Given these profound constraints, what is fascinating is the motivation for time travel as explored in four scenarios. Thanks Amy, for this book.

Everyone On This Train Is A Suspect – Benjamin Stevenson

Spoiler alert: there is a murder on a train, a plot device that has been used before, I think. The key to this very entertaining book is the context – the Australian Mystery Writers Festival takes place on a train, the Ghan, as it travels from Darwin to Adelaide. Six authors are invited to participate in literary discussions about their books, but when one is murdered, can the remaining crime writers turn into detectives, to solve the murder? There are wonderful phrases like “knees that click like the Wheel of Fortune” – great fun.

Cloudstreet – Tim Winton

Cloudstreet is a broken-down house in Perth, Australia, that becomes a home to two wildly disparate families, the Pickles and the Lambs. Their story begins in 1943 and spans about 20 years of heartbreak, turmoil, boisterous energy and yes, even some joy. Overall, a vivid portrayal of the remoteness of Western Australia.

The Capital of Dreams – Heather O’Neill

And now for something entirely different – this new O’Neill book is NOT set in Montreal. It is, in fact, a surrealistic fable. Elysia, a country based on art and ideas, is invaded by the dogmatic and ultra-conservative Enemy. There are two key features of this literary masterpiece. First, how does one survive in  dystopian future, with the arrest of cultural figures like writers and poets? Clara Bottom is a distinguished writer. How can her 14-year-old daughter survive? And so the second theme is the mother-daughter relationship. To be clear, this is a dark fairy tale of betrayal and survival, and there is a talking goose. A highly recommended read, but recognize that this is not a typical O’Neill book.

The Bright Sword – Lev Grossman

Grossman (author of the magnificent The Magicians trilogy) provides an entertaining re-imagining of the King Arthur legend by focussing on a young knight Collum who arrives in Camelot two weeks after the death of Arthur at the battle of Camlann. It is a time of chaos with conflicts between knights and pagan-Christian issues. Can Camelot be preserved, be rebuilt with only a few surviving knights of the round table? There are strong women like Morgan le Fay, Nimue, and yes, Queen Guinevere, imperfect men, quests and, of course, magical fairies. Highly recommended.

Darwin’s Bastards – selected and edited by Zsuzsi Gartner

Subtitled “astounding tales from tomorrow”, consisting of 23 short stories of future times and parallel universes. There are contributions by some very fine authors: Douglas Coupland, William Gibson, Jessica Grant, Yann Martel, Heather O’Neill, Neil Smith …. Uneven to be sure, but worth a read.

The Last Devil To Die – Richard Osman

This fourth book about the four septuagenarian members of the Thursday Murder Club has the usual crime mystery elements, notably missing heroin and multiple murders. What distinguishes this novel is the emotional content, not just reflections on aging but on dementia and death. Funny, moving and suspenseful, a delicious read.