Review search
Can You Hear the Sea? My Grandmother’s Story (Brenda Niall, Text)
Released November 2017
When Brenda Niall was 10 years old her grandmother gave her a cedar box that was made more than 50 years ago by a brother who died as they were... Read more
If Baby Could Talk (Michael Wagner, illus by Jess Racklyeft, Windy Hollow Books)
Released September 2017
It’s never too early to start reading books to children; even newborns will derive pleasure from listening to words read out loud by a loved one. If Baby Could Talk... Read more
Whimsy and Woe (Rebecca McRitchie, Angus & Robertson)
Released September 2017
Adventurous and outlandish, Whimsy and Woe will hook kids in from the first page. The story follows the eponymous Mordaunt siblings in unravelling the mystery of what has happened to... Read more
When I Grow Up (Tim Minchin, illus by Steve Antony, Scholastic)
Released October 2017
From the award-winning Australian composer and comedian Tim Minchin comes a picture book inspired by Minchin’s lyrics to the song ‘When I Grow Up’ from Matilda the Musical. The song/story... Read more
The Sorry Tale of Fox and Bear (Margrete Lamond & Heather Vallance, Dirt Lane Press)
Released August 2017
Bear and Fox have a tumultuous friendship, marred by Fox’s pranks and mean tricks. However, when Fox disappears, Bear finds he misses his buddy. New companions Rooster and Hare seem to... Read more
The Amulet of Athlone: The Chronicles of Jack McCool Book One (R E Devine, Bauer Media)
Released October 2017
Things aren’t easy for Jack McCool. His teacher Miss Medusa hates him, the school bully picks on him and even his hair won’t sit straight. While he gets called ‘McNerd’... Read more
Drawn Onward (Meg McKinlay, illus by Andrew Frazer, Fremantle Press)
Released October 2017
Drawn Onward is a clever picture book for older children that explores the transformative power of perspective. Author Meg McKinlay has crafted a palindrome that will delight observant young readers with the... Read more
The Lion in Our Living Room (Emma Middleton, illus by Briony Stewart, Affirm)
Released October 2017
Emma Middleton and Briony Stewart’s The Lion in Our Living Room is a gentle picture book that celebrates the spirit of imagination in the same vein as Judith Kerr’s The... Read more
Koalas Eat Gum Leaves (Laura and Philip Bunting, Scholastic)
Released October 2017
Koalas Eat Gum Leaves is a funny take on the one fact that every budding naturalist knows about Australia’s beloved marsupial: they eat gum leaves. ‘Gum leaves for breakfast. Gum... Read more
Dungzilla (James Foley, Fremantle Press)
Released September 2017
Sally Tinker is an inventor—the world’s foremost inventor under the age of 11, to be precise—and her latest invention is a doozy. The Resizenator can shrink anything to microscopic size... Read more
The Trauma Cleaner (Sarah Krasnostein, Text)
Released October 2017
Sandra Pankhurst was adopted through the Catholic Church in the 1950s by a Melbourne couple who would prove to be horrendously abusive parents. Driven out of home by the age... Read more
Baby Lost: A Story of Grief and Hope (Hannah Robert, MUP)
Released August 2017
Baby Lost is a heartbreaking study of the aftermath of an accident that changed the author’s life. Hannah Robert—a law lecturer at Melbourne’s La Trobe University—is not a saccharine writer,... Read more
Force of Nature (Jane Harper, Macmillan)
Released October 2017
Jane Harper’s follow-up to her 2016 bestseller The Dry is another well-written, pacey crime thriller. Force of Nature is set after the events of The Dry but can be read... Read more
Suburbia (Jeremy Chambers, Text)
Released October 2017
Melbourne author Jeremy Chambers’ second novel is a nostalgic coming-of-age story set in the unglamorous outer-eastern suburbs of Melbourne in the 1980s. The book’s protagonist Roland is a bookish outsider... Read more
The Book of Thistles (Noëlle Janaczewska, UWA Publishing)
Released October 2017
This debut from Windham-Campbell prize-winning playwright Noëlle Janaczewska is a genre-bending mash-up that incorporates memoir, popular science, history and food writing. Janaczewska uses her lifelong personal interest in the thistle... Read more
Soon (Lois Murphy, Transit Lounge)
Released October 2017
Five four-wheel drives with tinted windows roll slowly, mysteriously, through a small Australian town during a winter solstice. Their purpose is unknown, their arrival an ominous portent. When they depart,... Read more
Drawing Sybylla (Odette Kelada, UWA Publishing)
Released October 2017
Drawing Sybylla is an ambitious piece of writing that shines a spotlight on the injustices and inequalities faced by women writers in Australia throughout history. The winner of the 2016... Read more
Bird Country (Claire Aman, Text)
Released September 2017
Claire Aman has regularly referred to Grafton, her northern New South Wales hometown, as ‘an inspiring town’. This inspiration is realised in Bird Country, a suite of quietly beautiful short... Read more
Two Steps Forward (Graeme Simsion & Anne Buist, Text)
Released October 2017
Martin, a divorced English engineer, and Zoe, a widowed American artist, are each at a turning point in their lives. Unexpectedly alone, without money or young families to care for,... Read more
A New England Affair (Steven Carroll, HarperCollins)
Released September 2017
The third instalment of Steven Carroll’s quartet based on the life of T S Eliot is a quiet but strong narrative centred on the poet’s muse Emily Hale. As is... Read more
