Did you know that the Aldabra giant tortoise (at 4.5 metres per minute) is the most sluggish of all tortoises and that its poo provides a culinary feast for hermit crabs? What about the star-nosed mole, who can eat five times its body weight in a day, making it the world’s fastest eater? Or the
When it comes to naming extinct animals, most of us would probably know the dodo and the woolly mammoth. But how many of the over 900 species classified as extinct since 1500, and the over 44,000 species threatened with extinction, could we actually name? The Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Extinct Animals by Sami Bayly can help
Australia is ‘further along the trajectory of climate grief’ than most other countries, according to Irish author Caoilinn Hughes, who says this may be one reason her latest novel The Alternatives has received a good reception here. Hughes was in Sydney ahead of her appearance at the Byron Bay Writers Festival (August 9-11). Her clear-eyed
In 1980 when Australian author Michelle de Kretser read Shirley Hazzard’s new novel The Transit of Venus she wondered what all the fuss was about. Twenty years later she reread it, and ‘the sensation came, like a blow to the breastbone,’ from the first page, ‘the shock of the great’. This anecdote from Brigitta Olubas’s
‘In the city, nature can feel far away – but is it?’ This question lies at the heart of Naturopolis – a new, creative non-fiction picture book for readers in years K to 6. The book’s elegant, double page spreads both describe and explore the natural phenomena found in ‘the great grey city’ and children
This bright berry of a book is upbeat and colourful. While there’s a lesson or two at its heart (one being to listen to your Dad because he might be able to teach you something you’d like to know) it’s also a fun story. When Ruby gets a gift of roller skates from her Dad,
On the surface, Peta seems like your typical pirate with his wooden leg, parrot on his shoulder, eye patch, Jolly Roger and propensity for exclaiming AAARRrgggh. But things are amiss in Peta’s life. He’s tired of plundering ships (just the thought of it ‘makes his peg-leg creak’ and shivers his timbers), the sea seems endless
There’s a world of delicious detail and wordplay in Harriet’s Hungry Worms – a new picture book from Samantha Smith (author) and Melissa Johns (illustrator) for readers aged 4 to 8. Harriet’s slimy, hungry, relaxed, shiny and healthy compost worms crunch, scoff, feast and snack. They munch on muesli on Monday, wild weeds on Wednesday and
Meet Mim keeps readers guessing right from the start through an intriguing game of underwater obfuscation. As we turn each page, we continue to wonder who, or rather, what is Mim? It feels like we’re getting nowhere – but we’re actually observing an interesting array of sea creatures including, the spotted flatfish, the spiked lionfish,
Immaculate is a captivating and unusual novel. It is also a nuanced examination of how faith grasped hungrily but imposed narrowly can segue into a slipperier sense of becoming, a wild tributary pulsing with possibility and sorrow. We first meet Frances when she is newly divorced from her pastor husband, rejected by the Christian community
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