‘All that fuss over a snot rag. Get over it.’ … please discuss. Why did Australian author Mark O’Flynn feel free to tamper with the Iago from Othello, who some say is Shakespeare’s most evil villain? This Q&A with O’Flynn takes you behind the scenes of how he wrote this brilliant story. Next week, I’ll
What orients us historically if we don’t know our forebears during our childhood? Is our sense of family contained in houses or other environments? How tenuous are the links between parents and children? What haunts us from the past and why? Lisa Gorton’s new novel, The Life of Houses, provokes this kind of questioning and
Sex and death — the two key subjects of fiction — are entwined and plentiful in esteemed Australian novelist Marion Halligan’s twenty-second book, Goodbye Sweetheart, said Carmel Bird, who launched the novel in Canberra on April 14. Bird, whose new short story collection My Hearts Are Your Hearts will be released by Spineless Wonders later this
What makes the human heart tick? Carmel Bird, in her new short story collection, My Hearts Are Your Hearts, deftly probes this question. Bird is one of Australia’s foremost writers and the 20 stories in My Hearts pulsate with life, blood and bravura. In this Q&A (as in My Hearts itself) Bird leads us to the
I hate Easter egg chocolate so books are my Easter treat. Who needs dud chocolate when birds, love, war, art forgery and poems of great immediacy are on offer? H is for Hawk Helen MacDonald’s photographer father died suddenly and training her new goshawk, Mabel, helped her through it. MacDonald’s an academic who writes about
Vanessa de Largie was 22 in 2000 when she arrived in Melbourne to pursue her acting career. Her bright hopes were bruised at the hands of her partner — a violent and unstable man, whose weapons included his fists and psychological manipulation. More than a decade on, de Largie is a successful actress and author, whose
It’s inevitable that author Jen Craig will be asked questions about the weight loss company that bears her name. Especially since the protagonist of her new novella Panthers and the Museum of Fire is called Jenny Craig and in the grip of anorexia at the time the diet company was launched. The topic was aired,
While you are waiting for the next review to arrive on this blog, get on over to A Bigger Brighter World’s Facebook page to keep feeling the love we have for the world of books. There you’ll find longlists and shortlists, announcements of prize winners, posts about the evolution of reading technologies and people wasting
Each year I send a book list to friends and contacts with highlights from my previous year’s reading — and they love it. This week The Cove Observer is publishing my list. Here it is for people who haven’t seen it yet and who don’t live in Lane Cove, on the Lower North Shore of Sydney.
Patrick Lenton’s collection A Man Made Entirely of Bats is a leap into the surreal, comedic, satirical, punchy and resonant. Launched on February 18, its short-short stories and micro-lit lift the spandex on super-heroes and turn over the rocks that hide strange things. The result is that rarest of birds: smart literature that makes you laugh.
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