Published...Or Not

We transcend time and identities as souls are passed from one indidual to another in Alex Landragin's, 'Crossings'.Will virtual reality be there just for entertainment or will it take over our lives? Some of the issues at play, in K.H.Canobi's YA novel 'Mindcull'.

'Little Stones' reveals the post colonial world of Zimbabwe through the eyes of an eleven year old girl who is negotiating her parents' divorce and the social upheaval around her. A University fo Queensland Press release.'City of Trees' by Sophie Cunningham is an engaging and moving collection of essays on life, death and the need for a forest. It is released by Text Publishing.

'From Secret Ballot to Democracy Sausage: How Australia Got Compulsory Voting' is a fascinating book by Judith Brett, released by Text Publishing. Melanie Cheng highlights the social and cultural forces that influence our lives when two individuals share accommodation in her novel, 'Room for a Starnger'. It is  aText Publishing release.

Wayne Marshall's debut short story collection, 'Shirl', was a runner-up in the 2019 Victorian Premier Awards' Unpublished Manuscript Competition, and will be published by Affirm Press in early 2020.Amra Pajalic's account of her childhood and her mother's battle with bipolar disorder is set against a backdrop of her Bosnian heritage and the cultural and even historical forces that came into play wh...

Second thoughts are not uncommon before a wedding but what do you do when you receive a note from your fiance's former girlfriend on the morning of the wedding? Sallie Muirden explores the anxiety and confusion of the bride facing such a dilemma in Wedding Puzzle."Choice Words: A Collection of Writing about Abortion" is edited by Louise Swinn, with a foreword by Tanya Plibersek, and published by A...

'Life Before' has an ordinary family caught in a terrible situation and 20 years on, a sister has to confront memories and a brother she hasn't seen since. Carmel Reilly's 'Life Before' is part family drama and part crime novel.'All The Tears in China' is the latest installment in the Rowland Sinclair series by Sulari Gentill. The shadow of Nazism prior to WW11 reaches to a cosmopolitan China wher...

'Simpson Returns' is a novella by Wayne Macauley that delves into the significance of the myths and tropes that shape our identity as a nation and how we may have lost sight of the values and meaning that underpin the stories we tell about ourselves. Journey with Macauley's mythical and quixotic Simpson on aquest to find the true Australia.

A plagiarised romance novel titled Lost and Found Heart is also a clever pun in Elizabeth Coleman's very humorous, 'Lost the Plot'.Mothers-in-law are much maligned. How much is deserved and how much is all just simple misunderstanding is explored in Sally Hepworth's 'The Mother-in-Law'.

Does sex appeal come with a use by date? Virginia Duigan has a happily married woman of older years, testing this in 'The Age of Discretion'.Anna Ciddor takes us on a nostalgic journey into the 60's' in her children's novel '52 Mondays'.

One migrant changes countries and changes the lives of those she meets. 'Invented Lives' by Andrea Goldsmith is set in 1980's Melbourne but has a back story of Russian history.'The Shining Wall' is Melissa Ferguson's glimpse of a dystopian future where hope's glimmer lies in the possibility of altruism.

Mark Brandi takes us into the drug sub-culture of Melbourne in his latest novel, 'The Rip'.The unsolved mysteries in the world of mathematics may cross all boundaries but will maths help to make or break a family in 'A Universe of Sufficient Size' by Miriam Sved.

An island can be a holiday destination as well as a metaphor for social and family continuity, but it can also represent how isolated individuals can become.  These actions are explored in Peggy Frew's 'Islands'.

'Highway Bodies' is a young-adult zombie-apocalypse novel by award-winning author Alison Evans. Crime is a caper in which the individual is often powerless. Such is the case for Lachie Munro, in Andy Muir's novel, 'Hiding to Nothing'.

A cursed painting sets the tone for the latest murder mystery by Katherine Kovacic, 'Painting in the Shadows'.  Will art dealer, Alex Clayton identify the clues that sets forgeries apart from the truth? Fires leave devasted bush land, burnt buildings and fractured relationships. 'Home Fires' by Fiona Lowe is set in the fictional community of Myrtle, before and after with the rebuilding and the ong...

'The Librarian of Auschwitz' is a story of courage and hope, written in Spanish by Antonio Iturbe and translated by Lilit Thwaites. Don Tillman, the hero of The Rosie Project and The Rosie Effect, now confronts raising his eleven year old son and the labels applied to children and those on the autism spectrum. The author is, or course, Graeme Simsion and the book is 'The Rosie Rebuilt'.

Logging or tourism, parenting attitudes, control, good fiction and football all come into play in a small Tasmanian community with 'The Orchardist's Daughter' by Karen Viggers. Identity, memory and abduction form the thread of intrigue in 'Call Me Evie' by J P Pomere.

A son is lost, a child is found and a trial ensues in Kirsten Alexander's 'Half Moon Lake' which questions if choice is prejudiced to the white and wealthy, set in America, 1913.Contemplative, Jane Carswell's work, 'Talk of Treasure' takes us on the journey of a book coming to fruition in a tale that is both mediative and thoughtful.

Once again, Bren MacDibble takes us into the immediate future where food secuity is compromised. 'The Dog Runner' looks at what happens when all grasses are destroyed and ten year old Ella and her half-brother, Emery, have to survive. How do you find your own identity, especially if you have a disability. Twins, Sea and Serene are co-joined physically, but does this make them agree to everything?...

Two worlds converge in Emily Brewin's, 'Small Blessings'; the priviledged life of Isobel and Rosie's social poverty. Both, however, are blessed in ways they perhaps don't realize despite the challenges they face. 

The Anne Elder Award has been bestowed annually since 1977 to recognize the best first book of poetry by Australian writers. The anthology, The Bright and the Cold, compiled by her daughter Catherine, and the biography, The Heart's Ground, written by Anne's niece, Julia Hamer, provide a perspective of a poetic voice and the creative spirit of an Australian poet who was the contemporary of such voi...

Holly Throsby has another small town crime or mystery read.  Two people come to 'Cedar Valley' on the same day, one to find out about her mother, the other to die. Australia is divided. Those effected by the virus have enhanced creativity but can't get into Cornucopia, a religous republic in the north. 'The Second Cure' is a fascinating read about scientific possibilities and political divides by...

Bill Jenkins explores the frailties, quirks and contradictions of individuals in his poetry collection, We Carry the Cave. As a psychologist,pastor and scientist, his perspective is both telling and revealing. Rosalie Ham takes us through drought, infidelity and administrative corruption in her latest novel about life on the land. It's entitles The Year of the Farmer.

Toni Jordan has written about a lost book and a secret love in 'The Fragments' which connects a literary mystery with the transitional times in politcs of 1936 and 1986.June Laurie's adolescent novel, 'into the air' is part of the Blake Collider series where we are taken into the strange world of the CERN laboratory and dimensional travel.

'(Definitely) the Best Dogs of All Time' is a charming and humorous gift book by Jadan Carroll with illustrations by Molly Dyson. A death on a remote cattle station, murder or suicide, but why?  Jane Harper's 'The Lost Man' is a crime novel involving three brothers.

If you enjoyed Pride and Prejudice and wondered what happened to some of the characters, you will delight in 'What Kitty Did Next' by Carrie Kablean. Chris Hammer takes us through the scorching landscape of outback Australia in his psychological thriller, 'Scrublands' delving into an inexplicable atrocity in a country town.