The Bookshelf

Kate, Cassie and guests examine all six finalists for the 2023 miles Franklin Literary Award.

Kate and Cassie read Colson Whitehead's Crook Manifesto, Elizabeth McCracken's The Hero of this Book and Emily Perkins' Lioness with poet Miles Merrill and literary scholar Bernadette Brennan

Kate Evans and Jonathan Green read Gretchen Shirm's The Crying Room, Richard Ford's Be Mine and Claire Kilroy's Soldier Sailor with historian Peter McPhee and writer Ashley Hay. Cassie McCullagh will be back for the next edition of The Bookshelf.

Kate Evans onstage with writers Colson Whitehead, Eleanor Catton, Richard Flanagan and Tracey Lien at the recent Sydney Writers Festival, on the state of the novel.

Aboriginal, Chinese-Malaysian and Muslim writer and academic Eugenia Flynn co-hosts the Bookshelf this week with Kate Evans, reading Anna Funder's Wifedom: Mrs Orwell's Invisible Life, Priya Guns' Your Driver is Waiting and Jen Craig's Wall with novelists Max Easton (The Magpie Wing) and Amy Taylor (Search History)

What is it about the Greek myths that make them so adaptable, reusable, ever popular – and up for all manner of rewrites?

Interviews with all six shortlisted authors for the 2023 Miles Franklin Literary Award from RN's The Bookshelf and Book Show (in alphabetical order). The shortlist was announced on 20 June; the winner will be announced on 25 July.

Stealing a manuscript, walking your grief along coastal edges and underhand behaviour at an international AIDS conference: Kate and Cassie read Dennis Altman's Death in the Sauna, R F Kuang's Yellowface and Briohny Doyle's Why We Are Here with guests Benjamin Law and Lee Kofman

A story of wandering pilgrims, woman brewers, stonemasons and eels – in the North of England from the 7th century until now; and Métis-Michif women in Canada across the twentieth and into the twenty-first century: Kate Evans speaks with Katherena Vermette about The Strangers (recorded at the 2023 Brisbane Writers Festival) and Benjamin Myers about Cuddy

Naked politicians, roadtrips with the dead, and funny-sad girls in Berlin: Kate and Cassie read Robert Gott's Naked Ambition, Lorrie Moore's I am Homeless if this is not My Home and Pip Finkemeyer's Sad Girl Novel with critics Jessie Tu and Madeleine Gray.

Step aboard this Book Club edition of The Bookshelf which is hopelessly devoted to the genre of Romantic Comedy.

Kate and Cassie recorded this edition of The Bookshelf onstage at the Sydney Writers Festival on Friday 26 May 2023 with writers Shehan Karunatilaka, Jason Reynolds and Grace Chan

Kate and Cassie read Benjamin Myers' Cuddy, Robyn Cadwallader's The Fire and the Rose and Emma Cline's The Guest with mediaeval historian Clare Monagle and novelist Laura McPhee-Brown

Kate and Cassie read Deborah Levy's August Blue, André Dao's Anam and Catherine Lacey's Biography of X with guests writer and curator Sheila Ngọc Phạm and theatre writer Tom Wright. Histories, family stories, identities, doppelgangers, secrets and lies.

Kate and Cassie read John Kinsella’s Cell Night: A Verse Novel, Jente Posthuma’s What I’d Rather Not Think About and Justin Cronin’s The Ferryman with poet and novelist Omar Sakr and documentary maker Johan Gabrielsson

When Salman Rushdie was attacked in Chautauqua, New York in August last year, Victory City, his latest novel, was already finished. Some say it's not only a return to form, but also uncannily prophetic. 

Reading Max Porter's Shy, Han Kang's Greek Lessons and Yan Lianke's Heart Sutra with writers (and writers-in-translation, both) Linda Jaivin and Ennis Ćehić

Reading Pip Williams' The Bookbinder of Jericho, Juan Gómez-Jurado's Red Queen and Nicole Flattery's Nothing Special with writers Ashley Kalagian Blunt and Joanna Horton

Savage explorations of the present, using different literary forms, in two new novels. Kate and Cassie are joined by guests film academic Bruce Isaacs and NZ literary leader Claire Mabey, to read Booker Prize winning novelist Eleanor Catton's latest, Birnam Wood, and American writer Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah's Chain-Gang All-Stars.

A journey through the myriad of ways weather presents itself in fiction for this monthly edition of The Book Club.

Reading Julia Langbein's comedic take on Hollywood's ruthless screen industry in American Mermaid, and Stephanie Bishop's The Anniversary, a watery mystery about creative tension and desire.

Reading award-winning novelist Rebecca Makkai's I Have Some Questions For You, along with The Silence Project by Carole Hailey. Plus, an interview with much-loved Irish novelist Sebastian Barry.

Reading Anindita Ghose's bestseller The Illuminated and Is Mother Dead by Norwegian author Vigdis Hjorth with guest reviewers Maria Takolander and Suma Iyer, and an interview with Australian author Alice Nelson.

Novels about infidelity can be cautionary tales but also reveal changing attitudes

Is there a more enduring theme in literature? From the ancient greats to bestseller romances, it's been the subject of both untold anguish and fascination. Why is it that we never seem to tire of this all-too-human experience?