Published...Or Not

Emily Spurr has researched brains, parasites, chat bots, psychological health and perimenopause and given us this humorous fictional relationship in ‘Beatrix and Fred’.The lives or three servicemen who died in World War One are cast against a backdrop of their heritage and their potential in Ross McMullin's latest historical biography, 'Life So Full of Promise'. Their loss is set against the exper...

Detectives with a difference, especially as one has a particularly good sense of smell, and that’s Monty the golden retriever in Louisa Bennett’s crime novel ‘The Nosy Detectives’. Murder and Melbourne seem to go hand in hand in Hugh McGinlay’s, ‘Silks’, where a circus aerialist is throttled at the end of a silk performance rope. Can milliner and part-time detective, Catherine Klint, establish if...

Willa watches the dramatization of Shakespeare’s Much To Do About Nothing and wants the same stirring in her heart and loins. She finds zing in the romance e-books she publishes but not in her real life.  Jessica Dettman has written a comedy of modern love in ‘Without Further Ado’.Living up to the expectation of your parents along with years of racism and sexism influence the health, the writing a...

Anna Kate Blair writes insightfully and amusingly while exploring the issues of social conformity, desire, sexuality and a career in art through her debut novel,  ‘The Modern’.The scarred and psychologically damaged platoon of the graves retrieval unit attempt to form a New Eureka in France after World War One but the utopia they strive for is soon compromised in Scott Bennett’s debut novel, ‘Nigh...

Allee Richards has written ‘A Light in the Dark’, a story of ambition, envy, and disappointment. The title can refer to the theatre world or hopefully the way forward from secrets and grief. The migrant experience and its impact echoes through Australia. Eva Collins has captured some of that sensibility in her poetry collection, ‘Ask No Questions’

Our lives, influenced as they are by our upbringing and past relationships, are both comic and even tragic. Such is the case in Rachel Matthews' novel, Never Look Desperate, as the central characters look for understanding as well as intimacy.

'The Heart is a Star' by Megan Rogers is a lyrical story about how we can uncover our true selves when we are forced to face the myths that make us.'Serengotti' sees not just characters but the very reader dislocated as we question the values and narratives we create. Eugen Bacon's narrative style is energetic and intriguing as her displaced characters face the challenge of survival.

‘The Hummingbird Effect’ by Kate Mildenhall. A kaleidoscopic story of four women connected across time and place by an invisible thread. Was Vincent van Gogh a good Samaritan or self centred artist? In ‘Vincent and Sien’ Silvia Kwon has written about a prostitute who became his model and lover during the time of his own artistic development.        

Another thought provoking crime novel by Amy Suiter Clarke. Instead of podcasts concentrating on cold case murders in ‘Girl, 11’ this time she has a cult-like church being exposed in ‘Lay Your Body Down’.A billycart race, a brother in jail and mum’s on again – off again friend all make life hard for Jimmy as he tries to make sense of the world while waiting for the Southern Aurora train to pass th...

 ‘Death in the Sauna’ by Dennis Altman is a murder mystery with an array of interesting characters who may all be suspects in this enjoyable story of politics, sexuality and secret lives. ‘Thaw’ is Dennis Glover’s account of Scott’s expedition to the Antarctic and the modern day consequences. More is trapped in the ice than we realize. 

‘Born For You’ by Magdalena McGuire has written a luminous short story collection about the intensity of women’s lives and reveals the myriad of ways that women are compelled to reinvent themselves and to confront who they were, with who they become. Politics, money and power are usually behind terrorism, but what connection does this have with young refugee woman? ‘The Tears of Hope’ is the first...

‘Monster Island’, the latest children’s book by George Ivanoff, is populated by strange and unusual creatures that could well be real. Bernie and Ivy must prevent poachers from stealing these curious mythical and prehistoric animals.  (Puffin)Is the purpose of life making the right choices when it comes to friends, family, relationships and especially your career. What if that career involves want...

Nine Year old Ruby and her father Mitch, had an itinerant lifestyle in Gina Perry’s debut novel ‘My Father the Whale’. Sixteen years later we see the repercussions of those lifestyle choices. In The Rush, Michelle Prak has the weather and her characters morph from friendly to violent in this tense and twisted thriller 65 

From boarding houses to share houses to tough accommodation on the streets, Libby Angel has written about a young women encountering like minded artists and activist in 1990’s Melbourne. ‘Where I slept’ has short colourful descriptions of these people and places.'Cursed Bunny' by Bora Chung was shortlisted for the Booker prize. Lisa speaks with her about her short story writing secrets and and wha...

Primrose has problems. It’s not just her obsessiveness but her marriage, her journalistic career, her first love living over the road and her entitled brother-in-law coming to stay. Nina Wan writes humorously about golf perhaps not being the answer in ‘The Albatross’.Truth and reality are blurred in Michelle Jager’s, Bird Bones, as Vera’s narrative of her childhood, her marriage and affair are dis...

Lisa Moule talks with author, literary agent and creative writing teacher, Danielle Binks on our Radiothon program. 

'The Heart is a Star' by Megan Rogers delves into a mother-daughter relationship against a backdrop of the untmed wilds of Tasmania's west coast. Three generations of women face the challenges of social, political and economic change in Armando Correa's novel, 'The Night Travellers'.

'The Glow' is a wonderfully spooky children's story (also for adults) by Sofie Laguna.'The Secret History of the Rainbow Trout Hotel' is a quirky novel about discovery where the protagonist, Andy Lightfoot, discovers new people, new ideas and new situatons. The author is David Metzenthen. 

'After The Rain' addresses the foundations of uncertainty within lives and even countries and is the debut novel of Aisling Smith. Lorraine Peck continues the crime saga of drugs and money which are all part of a violent crime family in 'The Double Bind'.

'Search History' by Amy Taylor is a sharp and funny debut novel about obsession and desire in the internet age. Catherine de st Phalle entertains us once again with familiar characters in 'Call Me Marlowe' where we find individuals and countries resemble each other when they try and avoid or escape reality.

Robert Gott's novel, 'Naked Ambition', mocks politicians, fundamentalists and public relations experts who all have a habit of over exposing themselves in one way or another. Claire Christian is the author of the contemporary and progressive new novel, West Side Honey, which is an inclusive, gently subversive and joyful rom com.

‘Where Light Meets Water’ is a big historical read. Susan Paterson has written about a sailor and the sea and the artistic talent that he shares with the woman who fights for him even though her own artistic abilities are overlooked in a time when class and gender were paramount.   The complex and transformative nature of desire is seen evolving with all its passion, jealousies and insecurities in...

Every family is different and in Jacinta Halloran, ‘Resistance’ it’s a therapist’s job to decide if a mother and father are fit parents but with so many other family stories in the book, how can anyone decide what makes a good parent. Dominic Smith explores just how much our past can haunt us in ‘Return to Valetto’ where long buried secrets from World War Two in an almost abandoned Italian village...

Angela Buckingham and Robyn Bishop talk with Lisa Moule about their short stories in the anthology, 'It's All Connected' released by Spinifex Press.

'Deep', by writer illustrator Jess McGeachin, plumbs the depths of the ocean, of space, of the jungle and even our own subterranean world of subways and sewers. The snippets of information will interest young and old alike.'The Tea Ladies’ are a group of older women who team together to solve this pot boiler of kidnap, murder and arson. Author Amanda Hampson has them handling organised crime and s...