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Banjo and Ruby Red (Libby Gleeson, illus by Freya Blackwood, Little Hare)
Released August 2013
Banjo is a farm dog who is hard-working, fun-loving and loyal. One day, as he is rounding up the chickens as usual, he notices that his favourite hen Ruby Red... Read more
Don’t Look Now (Paul Jennings, illus by Andrew Weldon, A&U)
Released August 2013
Ricky is the first person to admit that he is a little weird. He tends to see the world differently from everyone else, which is not something that endears him... Read more
Guardian of the Tomb: Arky Steele 1 (E Coombe, Lothian)
Released August 2013
Guardian of the Tomb is the first book in a high-concept, globe-trotting adventure series for junior readers from E Coombe, author of the book series ‘The Faraway Fairies’ (as Eleanor... Read more
Cairo (Chris Womersley, Scribe)
Released September 2013
Tom Button is a country lad who comes to Melbourne to study, but never gets around to enrolling. Over the course of the summer that idea is soon overtaken by... Read more
Profits of Doom (Antony Loewenstein, MUP)
Released August 2013
Inspired by Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine, Antony Loewenstein’s new book seeks to expand on Klein’s thesis that powerful business and economic interests exploit disasters to implement their own agenda.... Read more
What was Left (Eleanor Limprecht, Sleepers)
Released September 2013
This year has seen an impressive array of motherhood memoirs, with local writers Jo Case, Monica Dux and Anna Goldsworthy earning acclaim for their candid portrayals of childrearing. What was... Read more
The Life and Loves of Lena Gaunt (Tracy Farr, Fremantle Press)
Released September 2013
To encompass a person’s whole life in a book is no mean feat, especially if the person has lived a full and adventuresome one. However, author Tracy Farr manages to... Read more
Green Vanilla Tea (Marie Williams, Finch Publishing)
Released June 2013
Green Vanilla Tea is the winner of the 2013 Finch Memoir Prize and it’s easy to see why. Marie Williams, her husband Dominic, and their two sons Michael and Nicolas... Read more
Thornwood House (Anna Romer, S&S)
Released September 2013
This is Anna Romer’s first novel and it reflects her stated fascination with old diaries, letters and dark family secrets. It is also very much of the ‘rural gothic’ genre... Read more
The Night Guest (Fiona McFarlane, Hamish Hamilton)
Released September 2013
This impressive debut from Fiona McFarlane tells the story of elderly widow Ruth, who lives by the sea with a fabulous view of the ocean and the passing whales. Ruth... Read more
Trouble in Mind (Jenni Ogden, Scribe)
Released August 2013
Losing your mind, that quintessential ‘me’, even partially, through trauma, disease or disorder, frightens most people. Trouble in Mind is a collection of stories about people who have suffered just... Read more
Partners: Love is a Law Unto Itself (Harrison Young, Jane Curry)
Released August 2013
These stories detail adventures in sex and romance at a top law firm in New York. Each story focusses on a different character, such as a partner or litigator in... Read more
Drive By (Michael Duffy, A&U)
Released August 2013
A murder, a trial, a Muslim Lebanese-Australian crime family, drugs and police corruption: Michael Duffy packs it all into this fast-moving novel, set on Sydney’s mean streets. The story of... Read more
If I Tell You I’ll Have to Kill You (ed by Michael Robotham, A&U)
Released August 2013
A friend of mine recently told me that crime writing’s unusual pull on the imagination was that it began at the end. Often this means we are in the presence... Read more
The Short Giraffe (Neil Flory, illus by Mark Cleary, A&U)
Released July 2013
When the Boba the baboon gathers the tallest animals in the world together for a photo portrait, little Geri is embarrassed. ‘I’d better stay out of the photo,’ says the... Read more
Chasing the Valley (Skye Melki-Wegner, Random House)
Released July 2013
Sixteen-year-old Danika is a street kid in a world where a tyrant king keeps the population cowed with alchemy bombs dropped by royal biplanes. The only way to escape to... Read more
Jeremy (Chris Faille, illus by Danny Snell, Working Title Press)
Released July 2013
This picture book tells the story of a young kookaburra. He is discovered by the family cat when he is just a baby, with bulgy eyes and no feathers. The... Read more
Lightning (Felicity Volk, Picador)
Released July 2013
A road novel, a tale of magic realism, a story of two outsiders finding each other, and a search for identity saga. Lightning, an ambitious, finely written novel from first-time... Read more
Mr Wigg (Inga Simpson, Hachette)
Released July 2013
The book that comes to mind on having finished Inga Simpson’s Mr Wigg is Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. They share nothing much in common; Mr Wigg is set... Read more
Heist (Robert Schofield, Allen & Unwin
Released July 2013
Opening with a daring robbery at a Kalgoorlie gold mine, Heist is an action novel that doesn’t really live up to its potential. Its cagey hero Gareth Ford is on... Read more
